All I Need To Know To Be A Better Programmer
I Learned In Kindergarten

From the blog: The Codist {}


Programming is complicated stuff, but a lot of what makes a good programmer isn't all that different from the earliest learning we did in school.

The inspiration for this list came from the essay "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten" by Robert Fulghum at http://www.robertfulghum.com/.


1. Share everything.

Use open source where possible, and contribute to it when you are able. The collective wisdom of the entire community is better than the limited vision of a few large companies.


2. Play fair.

Give other technologies, frameworks, methodologies and opinions a chance. Don't think your choices are the only ones that work. The other choices may very well be better than yours; it doesn't hurt to check them out with an open mind.


3. Don't hit people.

Like #2, don't attack people just because they happen to use .Net or Java or PHP (I learned my lesson there!). Sometimes they might be more usable and useful than you think. You can learn a lot more from someone when you are not pounding them to a pulp.


4. Clean up your own mess.

Strive to deliver code that works. Never expect QA to find all of your bugs for you. Test your code often, both narrowly and broadly.


5. Don't take things that aren't yours.

Follow the licenses for stuff you use, don't just steal it and claim innocence later.


6. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.

Code reviews are a good but rarely used idea. Mentoring programmers with less experience than you helps the entire team. Just don't criticize people openly. Learning is not belittling people. Sometimes people will listen and sometimes they won't. Sometimes you might learn a lot from people you think are inferior to you.


7. Wash your hands before you eat.

Try to understand things before you set out to write code. Do prototyping, check out examples on the web, talk with other folks who do it, or even just play around. Architecting something you've never done before or worked with is tough cold turkey. The end result will work much better if you start with a clue.


8. Flush.

Don't be afraid to replace, rewrite, refactor or give up on something that is crap. Sometimes "when in doubt throw it out" is the best philosophy. Never fall in love with your code.


9. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Yes, programmers should be well supported in their work environment. A good chair, a quiet place to work, a decent computer and tools that make coding better and easier are essential. Managers should act as umbrellas to keep the crap from flowing down to the programmers. As a programmer, don't accept a life of lowly servitude. If the employer treats you poorly then find one who treats you better.


10. Live a balanced life

Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

I like Google's deal where 20% of your time is devoted to whatever you think it worth working on. Employers should (discretely) offer nap rooms or game rooms or some kind of chillout environment. Programming is hard mental work; sometimes you really need to give your brain a rest. Refuse to routinely work 80 hour weeks as the quality of your work will wipe out any gains in hours.


11. Take a nap every afternoon.

Working 24 hours a day doesn't make you more productive. Take breaks, go home, take a real nap. Often I have solved nasty problems by going home, and the solution came to me as I was driving away, or the next morning.


12. When you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.

Community is good for the soul; read blogs, learn about new languages or frameworks, participate in discussions and see what other people are doing. Just doing your job isn't going to make you a better programmer. Keeping your head down means you will eventually be obsolete.


13. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.

Every day something new and wonderful appears in the programming (and technology in general) world. Check it out. Be amazed. Learn something new everyday. It keeps your mind fresh, your options open, and your skills up to date. If you think programming is boring or dead then you may need a new career.


14. Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die. So do we.

Code goes stale and dies. Sometimes you just have to bury it and do it again. Fight against keeping terrible code bases around just to save money.


15. And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned - the biggest word of all - LOOK.

You won't learn anything at all if you don't try. Everything I learned in programming came from trying new stuff and generally playing around. Every morning I read a lot of sites to see what is happening in the programming world; I have been doing this since my first job in the early 80's (when it meant reading catalogs and magazines).

See, programming is easy when you look at it through 5-year-old eyes.

More Than Just Fun And Games

When I Was Your Age!

Found this on the net but I made changes to be more fitting to me,
plus it was written in Gen lazy spelling.

When I was a kid, older adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious stories about how hard life was when they were growing up.

“I had to walk twenty-five miles to school every morning . . . uphill BOTH ways and through blizzards.”

Right before summer vacation, they walked through 120 degree heat carrying a younger sibling on their backs to a one-room schoolhouse, where they maintained a straight-A average, despite their full- time, after-school job where they worked for 35 cents an hour to help keep their family from starving to death and that was in addition to household chores.

I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in Hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it! Yet now that I've reached the ripe old age of my thirties, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today.

You’ve got it so easy! Compared to my childhood, you live in a freaking Utopia! I hate to say it but kids today have no idea how good they have it.

Click the Enter button on the PowerPoint Presentation.

When I was a kid we didn’t have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!

There was no email! We had to actually write somebody a letter with a pen! Then after taking an hour to write the letter and spell checking it using something called a book titled 'Dictionary', you had to walk all the way to the end of your drive to place it in the mailbox and lift the metal flag announcing you have mail to be picked up. Of course, if you didn't have any stamps you had to go all the way to the store, buy a stamp, than cross the street and put it in a mailbox and wait for it to be picked up, processed and than delivered. Depending on where it was going that took like, up to a week to get there!

There were no MP3’s or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to bus it, walk it or beg your mother or sibling for a ride to the record store and shoplift it yourself! If you had it really bad, you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ usually talk over the beginning and screwed it all up!

We didn’t have fancy pancy stuff like Caller ID Boxes! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, the guy you didn't want to talk to because he wasn't cool enough or your fast food supervisor wondering where they {bleeep} you were - you just didn’t know!

You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy Sony Play Station video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600 with games like “Space Invaders” “Pac Man” and “Asteroids,” the graphics sucked, but we loved it!

There were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen forever! You could never win, the game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like life!

Sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 15 channels and there was no on-screen menu and the remote control was a sucky looking hunk of plastic and there was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I’m saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little brats!

This is exactly what I’m talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoiled.

You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in the 1980's

Outer Galactic!

My closet is packed with nothing! What am I going to wear to Saturn!?

I don't meant to stereo type women especially since I am one, but I am one of those women who will go into her closet for a special not of the norm kind of event and see that I have nothing interesting to wear.

* Wore that last Saturday

* Wore that for Thanksgiving

* Wore that for XXX's party

* Wore that for the summer picnic

* Don't like that

* Not right for this

DAMN! Nothing to wear!

Don't you just hate it when a guy says "What's wrong with this?" and he pulls out some dress you wouldn't wear to a food fight let alone some cool Outer Galactic Hot Spot.

So if you have already passed the medical test and your seat on the spaceship flight is booked than you may think your done... No... What are you going to wear? It may be all good and fine and dandy for your boi to wear jeans and his favorite Battlestar Galaxy t-shirt but us femmes want a bit more style when we arrive on Saturn.

However, your fashion nerdeta has found a solution. Orbital Outfitters, a new Los Angeles based company has promised to dress the first space tourists and crew members in style.

"When someone puts on an IS3 (sub-orbital space suit), they will be protected by the best technology we cam muster, yet they will look like they've stepped off the set of a science fiction movie," said Orbital Outfitters president Rick Tumlinson.

Tumlinson said the suits will have a Grand Prix or NASCAR jumpsuit look to them and will bear the colors and logos of the rocket firm on which the passenger is flying.

Unfortunately, the Orbital Outfitters website didn't have any designs to temp my palate, which means space tourist fashions will either be dreadfulness catwalk Milan or Judy Jetson Out Of This World. However, they have stated their mission is "to provide affordable, industrial quality spacesuits and related services to commercial and government space travelers and explorers." Sooooo a combination of both? As long as they have something relatively cute in black and in my size, I'll be content.

"With billionaires funding the new space companies and passengers paying up to $200,000 for a ride, safety is important. We intend to also make it chic," said Orbital Outfitters President Rick Tumlinson

Put your credit cards away, Tumlinson said Orbital Outfitters is planning to be on the leading edge of space suit fashion in the tourism but isn't expected to blast off until around 2008. It will deliver its first space suits in 2007 to crews of the California-based rocket powered vehicle company XCOR and then lease custom-fitted suits to the first mass space tourists.

Safety will be paramount and the suits will be made to protect passengers from extreme cold for reptilian gurls like me and will provide life-support functions for 30 minutes at 500,000 feet, or 95 miles high. Ummm isn't Saturn a lot further than that?

Here's the catch... the cost of leasing the suit for one trip is expected to be approximately $3,000 to 6,000 - that's what? Two or 3 X boxes bought on EBay?

Now, what am I going to do with my hair and make up?

A Career Where You Never Grow Old &

You Never Grow Up

We don't stop playing because we grow old. We grow old because we stop playing
- George Bernard Shaw

Amusing Mistakes By Job Applicants

In a cover letter:

"Here are my qualifications for you to overlook."

"Please call me after 5:30 because I am self-employed and my employer does not know I am looking for another job."

"My goal is to be a meteorologist. But since I have no training in Meteorology, I suppose I should try stock brokerage."

"I demand a salary commiserate with my expensive experience."

Reason for looking for a new job

"I am extremely loyal to my present firm, so please don't let them know of my immediate availability."

"Responsibility makes me nervous."

"They insisted that all employees get to work by 8:45 every morning. Couldn't work under those conditions."

Pushed aside so the vice president's girlfriend could steal my job.

In a resume:

"I was working for my Mom until she decided to move."

"Marital status: Single, Unmarried, Unengaged, Uninvolved, No Commitments."

"Note: Please don't misconstrue my 14 jobs as 'job-hopping.' I have never quit a job."

"Marital status: often. Children: various."

"Reason for leaving last job: They insisted that all employees get to work by 8:45 am every morning. I couldn't work under those conditions."

Objective: To have my skills and ethics challenged on a daily basis

Assorted ‘TMI (too much information)

Exposure to German for two years, but many words are inappropriate for business.

One job applicant had a heading called "Pet Peeves" which included such things as
"lazy workers, know-it-alls, spicy foods, etc."

"Personal: I'm married with 9 children. I don't require prescription drugs.

"Minor allergies to house cats and Mongolian sheep."

"I love dancing and throwing parties."

Small typos can change the meaning:

"Education: College, August 1880-May 1984"

"I'm a rabid typist."

"As indicted, I have over five years of analyzing investments."

"Received a plaque for Salesperson of the Year."

I worked as a Corporate Lesion.

Weirdest & Maybe Creepiest Job Seeker Acts

Brought a baby gift to the interviewer who was pregnant.

Sat next to the hiring manager in a church pew.

Left Yankee tickets for the interviewer.

Sent a nude photo of himself to the hiring manager.

Waited for the hiring manager at his car.

Came dressed as a cat.

Said they "smiled on command."

"Time spent laughing is time spent with the gods."
Japanese proverb

Where Are The Jobs?
Great Job Hunting Websites & Resources

National Garlic Day

April 19th is National Garlic Day which promotes a variety of uses for Garlic. Many people don’t know that it is both a vegetable and a herb. It’s used in recipes around the world as well as a medicinal cure for thousands of years. Ancient lore believed it warded off evil spirits such as vampires. However, I know several vampires who adore garlic. About the only negative thing you can say about it, is that it can negatively affect an otherwise romantic evening… unless you’re into garlicky breath, than you just must visit restaurant The Stinking Rose which proudly boosts a little food with they’re garlic.

As a medicinal herb:

• Phytochemicals in garlic are believed to provide protection against heart disease and cancer. Specifically, stomach and colorectal cancers.
• Helps to fight off colds and flu.
• Lowers blood cholesterol levels.
• Reduces the buildup of plaque in arteries.
• Used as a treatment for acne and warts.
• Used for toothaches

Found Strange Garlic Treasure:

Vampire Chupacabra using

(created using minced garlic and Cîroc vodka.)

From: Infusions of Grandeur Blog

Ingredients:
½ oz. Mad Scientician™ garlic vodka
½ oz. Mad Scientician™ jalapeño vodka
Dash of Tabasco sauce

Shake the two vodkas with ice, and pour into a shot glass. Then add a few drops of Tabasco over the top and drink.

The spiciness doesn't hit you at first; it tastes like garlic and bell pepper, then a slow burn sets in.

"And now my lips tingle," said the creator. "You don't taste any alcohol in that. That's a scary shot."

Did you know? Alliumphobia is the fear of garlic.

Culinary Arts