Author: Nadreck

Mood Driven Development

Chris over at CSS Tricks, telling it like it is:

But what is highly prized in our industry is productivity, in whatever form it takes.

“Hey, I refactored some of our mixins to be more efficient and made sure they are used properly site-wide.”

“Good morning, I looked over a lot of the copy around the site and have some ideas on what we can change to make it more clear and cohesive.”

“This afternoon I closed out a couple of long-standing bugs that have been bothering me.”

Any place I’ve ever worked, any of these things would have been applauded. Especially if they relate to the current team/project at hand. That’s what productivity is.

The danger is that you fight against urges to work on something different. You feel like you should be working on converting some layouts, and you feel guilty for tweaking some color palettes. You’re kind of into cleaning your inbox out right now, but feel like you are being lazy for not getting the JavaScript scaffolded out for that new thing. You’re finding a funny image to respond to a playful customer with, but you’re a little mad at yourself for not updating those docs.

That’s too bad, since you are being productive anyway. You’re following your mood.

Chris Coyier, Mood Driven Development

Loving Language

I was talking with a friend the other day about what I call “intellectual fappery.” This is in reference to the sort of academic papers (in particular in art criticism or art theory) that are so wrapped up with jargon and linguistic flourishes that it’s unreadable to a lot of people. It never made much sense to me that they’d do this (why make it harder to win people over to your point of view), and I sort of presumed that it was some sort of smug self-aggrandizement, speaking opaquely to keep out the riff-raff. (Another alternative is that they’re simply too inept at communicating their ideas, and so hide it behind linguistic flourishes.)

I had a minor epiphany, though: while some may be putting on airs, a lot may simply be in love with language. Not in terms of communication, but as expression. Flowery turns of phrase, using ornate, overly complex language not because they want to obscure their message, but simply because they think ornate, overly complex language is pretty. In short, an entire body of writing (looking at you, art theory and art critics) that prioritized form over function.

This doesn’t really make it any more fun to read (especially since you’re usually subjected to it as part of studies, rather than reading it by choice), but it does at least seem like a kinder way to look at things.

The Silence of the Algorithm

While I doubt that my own Twitter and Facebook experiences were/are general, I have periods of fascination with the way social media systems eventually failed me. I keep trying to look ahead to the near-future of digital social connection (without separating it out into an other thing from general social connection, even while I develop the creeping feeling that digital duality may not be a thing in cities but may be in sleepy seaside towns) — and I wonder if attempts at inclusion by algorithm aren’t just locking people in soundproofed boxes.

These are all part-formed thoughts I’m working through, but it strikes me this morning that Twitter going algo would break a (perhaps unspoken) promise made in an earlier age of the internet: that, like FB, it would become a heavily managed means of communication, with arcane rules of entry, that would have its own opinions on whether you get to speak or listen. Warren Ellis, The Silence of the Algorithm

Sorry, I blinked

And just like that, it’s the end of August. The year has flown by (which is to say, I was aware of every excruciating minute of it, but once past the moment I’d say “Whoa, where’d the time go”). I’m currently writing from Squam Lake (as I’m fond of doing), where I’ve been for the past week, enjoying the peace and quiet and not-having-to-do-anything of it all. I get up when I want, go for a swim, and fiddle with what I want (rather than what I feel like I should).
Continue reading “Sorry, I blinked”

Link: Why Learning to Code is So Damn Hard

Why Learning to Code is So Damn Hard over at Viking Code School. Nice article discussing the different phases of learning to code, and how to deal with each.

I usually wipe out somewhere in phase 2 or rarely phase 3, which is why I like to say I can read/figure out a fair number of languages, but not write them. Next time I take a stab at learning to program, I’ll try to bear this info in mind.