Office is Bloated, Let's Add More

"There has been a lot of skepticism about the usefulness--and necessity--of the Ribbon, and I have to admit that I was among the doubters. Why change something that works? Because, according to Microsoft, the current interface has become bloated with too many menus."

Ugh. It's bloated, so we'll add features …

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My Microsoft Blind-Spot

Hobbit says:

"Everything in the windows world does not directly work with the "rapidly-evolving" windows api's (for example, c# devs rarely concern themselves with api calls.) If there is such a lack of clarity in these API's causing a "barrier to innovation," why is windows still the easiest and most …

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Notable Failure of Use Cases - Part 4

I recently reviewed some end user-authored use cases, and they -- of course -- reflect the way people actually work. The computer system was largely incidental to what they did.

Each use case listed half a dozen actors, had a dozen or more steps, and involved many off-line interactions among the actors …

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The Cost (and Benefit) of Open Source

I've had this conversation more than once.

Me: "We can download something like POI to read the Excel™ files. Or I can spend months writing something."

Them: "We have a policy against open source software."

Me: "Do you use Apache ?"

Them: "That's different."

Me: "How so? Be specific in enumerating …

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Doctest beyond Python

This is something that elevates Doctest into the realm of Pattern. Perhaps even above that.

The idea is so elegant: the document is the test, and the test procedure is the document.

There's a DRY clarity to the whole thing that is rather exciting. It is an elegant application of …

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