Best of Feeds – 47 links – programming, blogging, career, blog, interview, fizzbuzz

Best of Feeds is a regular series where I link to the stuff I found interesting from my feed reader. Links are sorted based on how many people have bookmarked them on del.icio.us. They are posted as asides daily at 7pm EST and then collected together in a single post on Saturday. I don’t blog on the weekend so read these links instead.

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This time I have 47 links from: barcamp, baron.vc, labnotes, outer-court, bradfitzpatrick, burningbird, codecraft.info, codinghorror, connectedinternet.co.uk, defmacro, dev.tufuncion, dilbertblog, diveintomark, dr-razavi, emacspeak, expatsoftware, firefoxies, gregladen, guelphmercury, haacked, headrush, icecreamgangsigns, imdb, johnchow, kbcafe, labnol, lostgarden, modernlifeisrubbish.co.uk, ofzenandcomputing, poynter, problogger, publishing2, randsinrepose, readwriteweb, scottberkun, sheldoncomics, thrillingwonder, violentacres, weblog.raganwald, webomatica, wired, zafar.se, zenhabits, zod2008

• [RESUME] A Glimpse and a Hook (randsinrepose.com, 2149 saves)
  • (resume, career, jobs, tips, guide, cv, advice)
  • Rands goes into how a manager parses an engineering resume. Looking forward to his book :)
• [CODE] Classic Texts in Computer Science (zafar.se, 980 saves)
  • (programming, books, reference, computerscience, papers, coding)
  • Big list of things to read.
• [CODE] The Nature of Lisp (defmacro.org, 757 saves)
  • (lisp, programming, language)
  • From the article: ” My attempt to learn Lisp came to a halt as soon as I saw some sample code. The same thought ran through my mind that ran through thousands of other minds: “Why on Earth would anyone want to use a language with such horrific syntax?!””
• [CODE] Why Can’t Programmers.. Program? (codinghorror.com, 402 saves)
  • (Programming, hiring, software, development, interview)
  • I’ve linked to all of the articles Jeff quotes before, but still a good summary of the issues people are facing when hiring software engineers.
• [ATTN] The Attention Economy: An Overview (readwriteweb.com, 290 saves)
  • (attention, web2.0, economics)
  • The information explosion is changing the way people consume information. Attention is become a form of currency.
• [PHOTOS] The Glamour of Flight (thrillingwonder.blogspot.com, 193 saves)
  • (retro, vintage, Photography, stewardess, Fashion, history)
  • Vintage airline stewardess photos. Best job I ever had in a past-life.
• [RSS] 34 Reasons Why Readers Unsubscribe from Your Blog (problogger.net, 189 saves)
  • (blogs, rss, blogging)
  • The reasons I contributed to Darren’s survey were: too many posts, partial excerpt feeds and I find that I never read the feed.
• [CODE] Why great coders get paid far too little (codecraft.info, 180 saves)
  • (programming, career, Development, productivity)
  • From the article: ” I think you low-balled the amount that the rewrite should reduce the code size. I’d be willing to bet that I could rewrite any piece of software in half the lines of the original. In fact, I’d take a fixed priced bid on a rewrite for anything up”
• [DESIGN] Lost Garden (lostgarden.com, 154 saves)
  • (blog, design, games, programming)
  • Just in case you think your blog is good, check out Lost Garden. Wow, what an amazing blog.
• [COMICS] General Zod – 2008 Presidential Candidate (zod2008.com, 129 saves)
  • (politics, humor, funny, superman, zod, comics)
  • From the article: ” “I am General Zod!” he bellowed, surveying the masses. “Listen to me, people of the Earth! Today I bring a new order to your planet! Your lands, your homes, your possessions, your very lives — all of this and more you will gladly give to me! In ret”
• [DIGG] I Bought Votes on Digg (wired.com, 75 saves)
  • (digg, blog, wired)
  • Wired news creates a crap blog and uses User/Submitter to buy diggs.
• [CAREER] Don’t Treat Your Employers Better Than They Treat You (violentacres.com, 66 saves)
  • (career, jobs, rants)
  • From the article: ” I’m getting sick and tired of companies expecting that their employees give them better treatment than they’re willing to dole out.”
• [BUSINESS] Too many companies are like bad marriages (headrush.typepad.com, 44 saves)
  • (marketing, business, customers, relationships)
  • From the article: ” It’s been said that the secret to a good marriage is… don’t change. In other words, be the person you were when you were merely dating. Don’t stop paying attention. Don’t stop being kind. Don’t gain 50 pounds. Don’t stop flirting. Stay passionate,”
• [FF] Welcome to Firefoxies! (firefoxies.com, 43 saves)
  • (firefox, browser, photos)
  • Hot or Not for users of the Firefox browser.Welcome to Web 2.0 :)
• [VISTA] Choosing Anti-Anti-Virus Software (codinghorror.com, 39 saves)
  • (vista, software, security, performance, windows, anti-virus, xp)
  • Windows Vista security is still putting a bandaid on after the fact. It inherently screwed up and you make your computer much slower by putting in all the hacky security features like anti-virus.
• [MEDIA] The Great Media Industry Schism (publishing2.com, 34 saves)
  • (media, web2.0, Distribution, content, Attention)
  • From the article: ” The once monolithic media industry is undergoing a radical schism, dividing itself into content creation, on the one hand, and content aggregation and distribution on the other.”
• [TECH] Code on the Road: Two Weeks Vacation is only a Recommendation, not a Rule (expatsoftware.com, 27 saves)
  • (career, vacation, travel)
  • Take more vacation than you have paid vacation. Enjoy life.
• [LIFEHACKS] Top 10 Productivity Hacks – Overview (zenhabits.blogspot.com, 22 saves)
  • (productivity, lifehacks, habits)
  • Common sense stuff, but important to integrate into your life.
• [IDE] An Emacs Client For Google Services (emacspeak.blogspot.com, 15 saves)
  • (google, emacs)
  • From the article: ” Google offers a number of services using a Google account. Many of these services also expose a Web API. this package provides a set of Emacs modules for accessing these services from inside Emacs.”
• [DIGG] How to Not Get On the Digg Homepage (blog.outer-court.com, 14 saves)
  • (digg, socialmedia, socialsoftware)
• [IDE] Howto use VI (dev.tufuncion.com, 11 saves)
  • (vi, linux)
  • Worth bookmarking if only for the Clippy VI assistant animation.
• [MEETINGS] How to start meetings on time (the honest version) (scottberkun.com, 9 saves)
  • (lifehacks, meeting, tips)
  • My office culture is really bad at meetings. Time to print this and circulate.
• [CODE] Thank you for writing such a heartfelt critique of the Fizzbuzz screening question (weblog.raganwald.com, 8 saves)
  • (career, fizzbuzz, programming, raganwald, interviewing)
  • Raganwald responds to Shelly Powers’ critique of FizzBuzz.
• [MOVIES] Academy Award Winners (imdb.com, 8 saves)
  • (oscars, movies)
  • the winners
• [COMICS] How a Blaugh Comic Is Created – With Video! (bradfitzpatrick.com, 7 saves)
  • (blog, cartoon, comic, howto)
  • Online web comic how-to
• [COMICS] The Dilbert Blog: Most Frequently Asked Questions (dilbertblog.typepad.com, 7 saves)
  • (articles, comics, dilbert, scottadams)
  • Scott Adams FAQ on being a syndicated comic creator.
• [BLOG] How to Start Your Own Blog (ofzenandcomputing.com, 6 saves)
  • (blogging)
  • Overview
• [PHOTOS] Exclusive (for now) Interview with Digg’s Favorite Photographer Trey Ratcliff at Baron VC (baron.vc, 6 saves)
  • (photography, hdr, interview, digg)
  • From the article: ” Trey Ratcliff is an amazing photographer making a name for himself with a slew of amazing photographs that have populated Digg’s front page so much that he has been dubbed –Digg’s favorite HDR photographer–.”
• [LINUX] Ubuntu HOWTO from Z to A (diveintomark.org, 5 saves)
  • (howto, linux, reference)
• [BLOG] Ethical Blogging 101 (modernlifeisrubbish.co.uk, 4 saves)
  • (blog, blogging, ethics)
  • From the article: ” Blogging is an area that can be fraught with legal and ethic issues – in many ways these reflect the way journalism is affected by ethics and the law, but with blogging there’s one significant difference – anybody may start a blog on just about any”
• [BLOG] How to be a Good Guest Blogger (problogger.net, 4 saves)
  • (guestblogging, blog, blogging)
  • From the article: ” Being a good guest blogger is like being a good guest in any situation. Do everything in your power to leave the place you are visiting in better shape than when you arrived and you’ll create a great impression.”
• [CODE] Learning from FizzBuzz: the developer pysche and code reuse (blog.labnotes.org, 3 saves)
  • (fizzbuzz, development, hiring, interview, programming)
  • From the article: ” coming up with a solution that is slightly better than the person before you, is proof of your technical abilities. But it also tells about your problem solving skills. That given the chance, you’ll prefer the feel good path over the efficient pat”
• [RSS] RSS Reader Reviews (kbcafe.com, 3 saves)
  • (rss)
  • Quick list of popular RSS readers. I recommend Google Reader.
• [CODE] FizzBuzz is a Perfect Example of What’s Wrong with Programmers (burningbird.net, 3 saves)
  • (interview, jobs, programming, fizzbuzz)
  • Shelly Powers on the “Programmers Can’t Program” bruhahah.
• [WINDOWS] Replace Windows Add/Remove Programs with MyUninstaller (labnol.blogspot.com, 2 saves)
  • (windows)
  • Replace “Add or Remove Programs” with a tiny app that does a better job. Looks useful for finally getting rid of a lot of the cruft things leave behind.
• [CODE] Why Can’t Programmers… Read? (haacked.com, 2 saves)
  • (fizzbuzz, programming)
  • From the article: ” I think reading comprehension must be at an all-time low among graduating programmers. Perhaps it’s time to bring back more word problems in our curriculum. Of course we’ve all seen this lack of reading comprehension in comments to our blog post”
• [SPEECH] The Dilbert Blog: Lights Out (dilbertblog.typepad.com, 2 saves)
  • (scottadams, dilbert, kevinsmith, publicspeaking)
  • Scott Adams on giving an unprepared speech on a moment’s notice. Reminds me the techniques used in An Evening with Kevin Smith. Don’t answer the question they asked, answer the question you wished they asked.
• [POLITICS] 911 Reverberates in Boston (gregladen.com)
  • (bush)
  • From the article: ” I have no problem with the idea that this was a terrorist act. However, treating it like a terrorist act instead of a criminal act was the beginning of a series of events … many of which may have been appropriate responses to terrorism but not to”
• [ESSAY] The Future Of Computing: Brains In A Jar? (webomatica.com)
  • (essay, future, technology, wired, internet)
  • From the article: ” People are getting progressively more dependent on the wired world in subtler ways. Trivial information – the stuff I probably should remember but choose not to – is increasingly delegated to the net.”
• [HOWTO] Activity Guide for Procrastination (icecreamgangsigns.wordpress.com)
  • (howto, squid, food, procrastination)
  • How to prepare squid.
• [TRAFFIC] The Dos And Don’ts For Driving Traffic To A New Website (connectedinternet.co.uk)
  • (blogs, blogging, traffic)
  • Tips for getting traffic on a new blog.
• [OTTAWA] BarCamp / BarCampOttawa3 (barcamp.org)
  • (ottawa, barcamp)
  • From the article: ” Google offers a number of services using a Google account. Many of these services also expose a Web API. this package provides a set of Emacs modules for accessing these services from inside Emacs.”
• [FATBLOGGING] Sleep More, Weigh Less (dr-razavi.blogspot.com)
  • (fatblogging, sleep, weightloss)
  • Staying up all night blogging is a sure way to gain weight.
• [COMIC] Too Much Coffee (sheldoncomics.com)
  • (sheldon, coffee)
  • It made me laugh because it’s true.
• [BLOG] Guestblogging – John is Busy Slaying Pandas, I’m Filling In (johnchow.com)
  • (blogs, blogging, guestblogging)
  • Matt Coddington on why guestblogging is a good idea
• [NEWS] Libraries shedding stodgy image to attract teens (guelphmercury.com)
  • (news, canada, library)
  • Canadian libraries are trying to change their image and appeal to teenagers. I love the library, I’m there at least once a week.
• [HUMOUR] It’s called a News-Paper (poynter.org)
  • (news)
  • What if browsing the Internet for news had come before the newspaper?

Tags: Attention, Development, Distribution, Fashion, Photography, Programming, advice, anti-virus, articles, attention, barcamp, blog, blogging, blogs, books, browser, bush, business, canada, career, cartoon, coding, coffee, comic, comics, computerscience, content, customers, cv, design, development, digg, dilbert, economics, emacs, essay, ethics, fatblogging, firefox, fizzbuzz, food, funny, future, games, google, guestblogging, guide, habits, hdr, hiring, history, howto, humor, internet, interview, interviewing, jobs, kevinsmith, language, library, lifehacks, linux, lisp, marketing, media, meeting, movies, news, oscars, ottawa, papers, performance, photography, photos, politics, procrastination, productivity, programming, publicspeaking, raganwald, rants, reference, relationships, resume, retro, rss, scottadams, security, sheldon, sleep, socialmedia, socialsoftware, software, squid, stewardess, superman, technology, tips, traffic, travel, vacation, vi, vintage, vista, web2.0, weightloss, windows, wired, xp, zod