Joel on Software

13 Jan 2009

My next entry for my digital reading list:

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/

Joel’s been writing a blog since December 1999, I only know this because I went back through his archives and read every single one of his posts.  Madness?  Not quite, but close.  I forget exactly how I stumbled upon Joel, but once I read a few of his articles, I was hooked.  Go back and start at the beginning of his posts, or rather, read the best of the best; they are listed in a column on the right hand side of his site.  A few posts I continually go back to:

The Guerrilla Guide to Hiring.  I have based my whole interviewing technique off of Joel’s guide, (with a few tweaks… I’ll talk about my interview technique in a later post).  This is a must read if you are doing the interviewing, and is even a better read if you are sitting on the other side of the table.  Its almost like cheating, you know what they are asking you and why.  Don’t take me for one of those to game the system, however I always like to be prepared.

Honestly, if you were gaming the system an interviewer worth anything should be able to pick up on the fact you knew a little too well what they wanted to hear.  And if they didn’t notice the fact you were gaming the system I’m not sure you would want to work for that company.

Talk at Yale Series, parts 1 - 3.  I always like to know a little bit about who I am following/reading…take a peak into their past, see if their values match up with mine.  I use the same strategy when I invest in Mutual Funds.

::I like to think I’m a bright guy with decent values…and given unlimited time and energy to do my day job and trade stocks I think I could manage my own mutual fund.  Thus, I want to find someone who thinks like me, and they have the time to concentrate on the stock market.  So far this strategy has worked…well except for this whole recession thing going on right now.::

Know thy blogger and learn from their past.

Can Your Programming Language do This? This is a hard-core article about computer science, but Joel breaks down the concept of functional programming and why you need to know/understand what it means.  Once you grasp the concepts you now know enough to create your own Google.

I plan on citing Joel in a few of my upcoming posts, so take some time, go back, and catch up on his past works.

Go a head, I’ll wait.