monkinetic the blog

Pike

I am once again editing this site in “Pike”. Yay! Now I have to review how to write rules, so I can get my rules set up right on this machine. (My iBook.) Rules are now working. Now that I’m in Pike again, it’s like being in Frontier (actually, those in the know will make the case that I am in Frontier…) “;->”. I have my HTML menu, and my outliner, and because I know how, I can customize Pike to do whatever I want it to.

Outlining your ear off

No doubt about it, outlining makes me a much more prolific writer. I find it so much easier to express myself in a structured editor.

Speaking of structured editors, I was describing “Frontier” to another developer this evening, and he just nodded the whole time, until I got to Frontier’s outliner. Describing the process of editing code in an outline to him, I watched his face light up. I love that! I expressed to him, as I do to every developer I expound to, that if only I could get a scriptable outline code editor that would do syntax highlighting, I could stop IDE shopping.

Just to prove I could do it, I got Frontier talking via Applescript to Sun’s javac the other day, and was writing Java code in the outliner, and compiling it in javac. Yum!

Resumes and Headhunters

I’ve had my resume up on my site for a long time. I’m not looking for a job, but I think of my resume as a publicly available doument, a reference of sorts.

Lately I’ve started getting emails from people I can only assume are headhunters saying they saw my resume online, I have skills they’re looking for, and have a great opportunity for me if I’ll contact them. Java is big (though if they looked closely they would see that my resume says JavaScript), as is eCommerce. The couple I actually talked to (they called me at work, no less) wanted to know all about what kind of work I’m doing, what tools I use, but were very slow to offer details about the opportunities they have to offer. Oh- I also blew off someone I thought was an annoying headhunter, but on reflection was probably just a desperate corporate recruiter.

I don’t know what brings them out of the woodwork. Nothing has really changed for me in the last few months, that I can think of. Somehow I got on some recruiter’s list, and they’re all pitching me, hoping someone will get me to swing.

I’ve changed my resume, so it expicitly states that I’m not currently seeking a change of employment. My boss will be happy to hear it. Maybe it’ll get them to leave me alone. But I doubt it.

Microsoft “.Net”

Chatting with Josh Lucas the other day, I wondered aloud (well, in print, er, IM) about “Microsoft”’s new “.Net” (“dot-net”) strategy. I think this is a big chance for Microsoft to do some great, open, things for both developers and consumers.

The technology is there, to be open, and amazingly powerful. But it’s also published, and visible. Lock-in will be harder - not impossible - but harder, no matter what Bill says. (Look about half-way down, for Bill’s comment’s about second-class citizens. He burns me up sometimes.)

But in typical MS style, the strategy may be too Microsoft-centered. Even the name breathes arrogance, presuming to usurp the “.net” top-level domain moniker for the name of the platform. Come on, guys.