Ferry Boender
Programmer, DevOpper, Open Source enthusiast.
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Category: opinion
Performance optimization: The first thing to do
In the last couple of years, I’ve done a lot of performance optimization. I’ve optimized raw C, Python and PHP code. I’ve optimized databases: tweaked settings, memory usage, caches, SQL code, the query analyzer, hardware and indexes. I’ve optimized templates for disk I/O, compilation and rendering. I’ve optimize various caches and all kinds of other […]
Re: Unit testing is not (generally) useful
There is a post up on Bill Moorier’s blog about the usefulness of Unit Testing. In it, he writes the following, which largely sums up his post: The metric I, and others I know, have used to judge unit testing is: does it find bugs? The answer has been no. For the majority of the […]
Frustration-Free Packaging
Amazon has a Amazon Frustration-Free Packaging initiative: The Frustration-Free Package (on the left) is recyclable and comes without excess packaging materials such as hard plastic clamshell casings, plastic bindings, and wire ties. It’s designed to be opened without the use of a box cutter or knife and will protect your product just as well as […]
Rant: Dicts that are not dicts
There’s something I have to get off my chest. I HATE it when things in Python pretend to be something they are not. I often use IPython to introspect things so I know how to use them. Lately, I’ve been running into more and more libraries which return things that pretend to be one thing, […]
Free Speech
Free Speech. Why is it important? Because it’s an extension of Free Thought. Should we be able to think whatever the hell we want? Yes we should. Controlling Free Speech is about nothing more than controlling Free Thought. “You’re not allowed to say this, because somebody might not agree with it. You’re not allowed to […]
WordPress
I just finished writing an article for my blog. It took me most of the evening. Researching, writing, proof-reading, rewriting, linking to articles, etc. I click save, and only one-third of the article shows up in WordPress. The rest? Gone. Hours of my hard work? Gone. Careful proof-reading, rewriting, analysis, unbiasing, rereading? Gone. THANK YOU […]
Customers…
Customers (as well as business partners, prospects, etc) are not: Aliens Humour impaired Poisonous Unreasonable Inhuman Somehow invulnerable to the same problems we all face in day to day business. Even if they’re wearing suits!
The real problem with Wikipedia
According to many, Wikipedia’s biggest problem is that it can’t be trusted because anybody can edit it. Personally, I feel that the problem is that experts are allowed to edit it. Hypercholesterolemia Conditions with elevated concentrations of oxidized LDL particles, especially “small dense LDL” (sdLDL) particles, are associated with atheroma formation in the walls of […]
Angry Whopper!! Pff.
The ANGRY Whopper, with ANGRY onions and ANGRY jalapenos! Hey, BurgerKing?! Your ANGRY advertisement just caused you to loose an ANGRY customer. Angry onions? Spare me. There’s no way this ad wasn’t made up by an American advertisement company. Well, guess what? I don’t like companies making me feel stupid when buying their products, so […]
Hof veroordeelt bedreiger Balkenende tot celstraf
Hof veroordeelt bedreiger Balkenende tot celstraf. Ik vraag me af waarom deze man wel celstraf krijgt, en iemand als Theo Maassen, die toch ook zo’n beetje heel de wereld al heeft bedreigd met de dood, niet. Lekker kieskeurigheid weer in Nederland. “Straf optreden, zolang we maar geen slechte publiciteit krijgen!”. Want het is natuurlijk meer […]
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