Here's another symptom of a Request for Faerie Dust™:

A proposal that includes (1) analysis, (2) proof-of-concept, and (3) a plan for a solution.

Sounds sensible, doesn't it? Study it, prove that you can solve it, and write the complete plan to solve it.

Sounded sensible to me, until I …

Here's a novel point of view on open source software.

'In fact, one of the things Google likes about open source software is that it facilitates secrecy. "If we had to go and buy software licenses, or code licenses, based on seats, people would absolutely know what the Google infrastructure …

Once I learned C++, all my C programming became poor-man's OO.

• Every "class" became a C structure type.
• Every class structure was implemented as a header file that defined the structure and a bunch of method functions.
• Each method function would have a "self" argument, which was a pointer to …

Since most of these new-fangled dynamic languages are open-source, we have a a strange artificial barrier to considering the right solution for our problems. This barrier is "No Open Source" policy, usually framed as We'll Use Open Source Over My Dead Body™. It has to be examined carefully from several …

My thesis is that CIO's are herd animals, making purchasing decisions based on the perceived direction of the herd. They sense this through Gartner research reports. There are many competitors, but Gartner is the name-brand.

If Gartner signals a shift in the herd, then alternatives may become interesting. How will …

In a recent code review, I saw a bizarre habit. The author defended it so vehemently, I gave up on trying to explain the needless confusion it caused. The author was one of those "I always do it this way, and I'm always right." people, so nothing was gained by …

Holub discards the currently popular dynamic languages with a scathing comment:

"And not scripting systems (I’m reluctant to call them languages) like PHP and Ruby, which are too Wild West to be trustworthy. No language that moves compile-time bugs into runtime is worth your time if you consider reliability …

Without mentioning Armour's The Laws of Software Process: A New Model for the Production and Management of Software (which includes the Five Orders of Ignorance, quoted by Paul Freedman in "Uncovering Ignorance in Software Development "), Purdy has hit the nail on the head regarding gestation of architectures.

Is Gestation overhead …

The customer -- usually someone from IT -- has met with the users, and determined what their problem is and what is required to solve it. This is the standard procedure, but it rarely works out well. Here are some scenarios and some coping strategies. After some hand-wringing about scope and budget …

First, let's pick the conclusion out of the middle: "However, the computation for the first and last business day of the month is trivial. So, just codify this."

Since we still lack any usable context, we're struggling with the definition of basic terms. Is this the calendar month, or the …