Jamie's Blog

Using Guard and Vagrant for Rails development

Background

I do all my development in a Vagrant VM and it’s mostly a seamless experience — except when using I was using guard. guard listens to file changes and runs the matching specs — it’s invaluable when doing any test-driven development. But...

Let’s be clear: Maximising time-in-app is hostile to users

I’ve been thinking a lot about how we can measure the value of a service to its users recently. This has led me to look at some ‘engagement’ metrics which often boil down to “how much time does the user spend on the site / in the app?”. The goal, apparently...

The Engineering Spectrum

There are lots of ways to characterise and evaluate engineers but I like to think of us along a single spectrum. At one end is electronics, binary code, assembler, registers and interrupts. At the other end of the spectrum is graphic design, art, photoshop...

Curing the SAD

About 2.5weeks ago I was ridiculously sleepy in the middle of the day, couldn’t think and was basically wiped out. It was like having the flu only without the fever or any actual sickness. I eventually realised that a lot of the symptoms pointed to...

Nothing changes unless you change it

Today, I was reminded of this passage from Jonathan Fields’ book ‘Uncertainty’:

In art, business, and entrepreneurship, there is no coasting. There is no neutral. No sideways. It’s a myth, an illusion. There’s only up or down. Leading or trailing....

Software has no intrinsic value

Someone asked me today about the value of a piece of software and how we go about measuring that. Here’s my reply: Software is no different from anything else: it’s only worth what you can sell it for.

As such, software has no intrinsic value — the...

The Accident

[box style=“notice”]This was written a few weeks after the incident but I’m publishing it now for the first time. I’ve left the content and tone exactly as written even though in hindsight I might have written it differently.[/box] [box style=“alert...

My New Leica

I’ve joined the exclusive Leica club!

Some people lust for months, years or even decades over a Leica camera due to the huge expense involved in buying into that system. The idea of getting a Leica occurred to me in town on Saturday and today, Tuesday...

Broken Houses

This is my 2nd year of taking part in the Solo Photo Book Month (SoFoBoMo). This year I chose the topic “Broken Houses” — a look at the abandoned houses on the Co. Clare coast. You can download the low-def book PDF from the SoFoBoMo site, or view the...

Sugru

I discovered Sugru just before Christmas and immediately jumped on the preorder queue hoping to nab a great present. As it turned out, lots of people did the same thing and they needed to ramp up production, so it was only recently that I finally received...

Random thoughts on life

I was putting Norah to bed this evening and she was giggling away at me as we played. And then I realised something… that little baby giggle is what life is all about. I could be free-and-single with no responsibilities or in a dual-income-no-kids...

Cork Photowalk, July 2009

Along with thousands of other photographers across the globe, I participated in the Worldwide Photowalk by joining the Cork photowalk organised by Donncha O Caoimh. I’ve never participated in one of these walks and street/city photography is way outside...

The Gallstones Diet

Disclaimer: I’m not your doctor, I’m not a surgeon and I’m not a dietician. I’m just a guy with some gallstone experience.

I have gallstones, as did my wife, and there’s a 1 in 5 chance that you will suffer from them during your lifetime. Basically...

Marketing Experiences from dualpricing.ie

Firstly, I should mention that I wasn’t trying to push dualpricing.ie too hard. It’s just a side project and, frankly, thousands of visitors is probably going to cause me problems that I don’t want to spend money or time fixing. However, I was quietly...

Thoughts on Software Development as a Career

There’s a fantastic thread on the JoS discussion board in which the original poster was considering leaving a career in programming for some other field. This spawned lots of comments (including from Joel himself) that touched on everything that it...

Dual Pricing

About 2 weeks ago I was thinking about the dual pricing issue in Ireland (whereby UK stores/brands markup their prices for the Irish market). There are many reasons given for this dual pricing (tax, wages, rent, transportation and most often, currency...

Man’s Search for Meaning

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars This is an inspirational book; not in that fluffy, chirpy plastic way of too many popular books but in the shear darkness of the author’s story and his attitude during it.

Part of the appeal of this book lies in...

The Paradox of Choice

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars A very interesting book about how an overabundance of choice creates stress and depression, particularly for a certain class of people (maximisers). Interestingly, it seems that I’m not a perfectionist but a maximiser...

The Dip

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
A fantastic book that every PhD student should read.
The advice is obvious but presented clearly and simply, making it a very powerful message: Winners quit (the right stuff). Basically, you can either quit your project...

Things I learnt during, and about, my PhD

This post might be written in a tone that gives you the impression that this is advice about your PhD. It’s not. It’s overly pessimistic and specific to my situation. These are (largely unedited) notes I collected between 2003-2006 when I was working...