So long as Atlassian add filtering and threading features to Javablogs in imitation of the evolution of mail and news clients, the Java blogging community will continue to grow and share good information. I just can't help thinking it will be missing something: that ineffable element that makes weblogging different. →

He avoids harsh language and abstains from it. He speaks such words as are gentle, soothing to the ear, loving, such words as go to the heart, and are courteous, friendly, and agreeable to many. →

The reposts were causing the little-known newsgroup to get a lot of attention. Everybody wants to associate with, and become a part of something that is funny and successful, and this inevitably lowers the overall quality of the place being inundated with newcomers. →

Too many Open Source projects treat Version 1.0 as some kind of Holy Grail that can only be reached when the project is perfect. I find that highly annoying, because it makes it really, really difficult to tell a sketchy alpha from production code that is just still in pre-1.0 because the author wants it to do everything. →

What it is, however, is highly resistant to floods of crap. The network routes around such damage easily. Nobody finds it interesting, nobody links to it, so it may as well not be there. Which isn't to say that AOL weblogs are going to be all crap: they'll just follow the general distribution such services have shown elsewhere. Those that aren't crap will be linked to, and become part of a larger section of the blogosphere. →

What occurred to me, was the well-known fact that the modern corporation exists as a means by which people can get involved in risky ventures, and then be protected from having to pay their debts by the government if the venture fails. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Libertarians. →

The law is not code. It is not compiled into an inviolate binary and run by a deterministic system. It is passed through the heads of human beings whose job it is to interpret the intent of the law. Courts generally look with disdain upon ‘clever’ interpretations of the law, unless that interpretation follows the court's conception of justice. →

Since we now have number portability, the net difference in cost and convenience between me staying with Vodafone or switching to a new provider is... zilch. Hence, a certain sale was turned into a vaguely pissed off customer with an incentive to see if he can get a better bargain elsewhere. →

Q: What can you brush your teeth with, sit on, and telephone people with? A: A toothbrush, a chair and a telephone. →

Maybe that means I'm not an alpha nerd any more. In twenty years some ten year old kid is going to try to teach me how to use the descendent of Tinderbox because I never caught on at the beginning, and Just Don't Understand... →

Dear Mum, you will be happy to know that after three weeks of my house-sitting for you, both cats are still very much alive and healthy. →

One story from Snopes that I quite like is the story of Van Halen and the Brown M&Ms. The story was that Van Halen's rider contained a clause that required a bowl of M&Ms to be supplied backstage, but with the brown ones removed. If they found any brown M&Ms, they could terminate the contract with the venue without penalty, and not perform. It's true. →

Other Director's Cuts are a marketing exercise designed to sell more copies of a video (or now DVD) by adding those bits of the movie that were filmed, but removed from the final cut because they screwed up the pacing, made the movie drag and generally added nothing to the film itself. →

This is Melvin the Money-box. He belongs to my mother. →

The maximum number of significant tasks I can work on concurrently is two. →

If you could care less about something, you are implying that there the thing in question has some measureable degree of importance, however slim, in that it is possible for that degree of importance to lessen. →

In a roundabout way, I came across a page about an IRC Channel discussing whether the channel should have a clear set of defined rules. As an IRC user for eight years, here's the formula I have found to be the only one that actually works: →

So, the moral of today's story. Don't just think about how to handle an error, also put thought into how you might recover from it. →

Hard limits, on the other hand, impose a strict cap on the disk space a particular user can be assigned. Attempts to exceed that usage are met with a reaction similar to the disk being full. Very few programs can cope with running out of disk space. →

When it says "24/7 Technical Support" on the box, I explicitly do not expect that to mean "you can email us any time of the week, but we'll only respond the next business day." →

This is just a test. Ignore it. →

I wanted to write a response to the circulating The Internet is Shit meme, but all I really kept coming back to was this piece of Usenet history from Russ Allbery →

I've been watching the RSS vs nEcho debate rage back and forth, back and forth for a week or so now. For those who came in late, don't worry what Echo is, go home. →

An architectslobby headline on Javablogs pointed out by a co-worker reads: "XML Beans: The Best of Both Worlds". While I haven't read the article it points to, I'm sure I could think up some better headline... →

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I'm not making a particularly controversial (or new) statement when I say that when developing some project, having the development team "eat their own dogfood" is a very useful technique. This is an advantage Open Source can have: what you get is some very well-chewed dogfood. →

Personally, I think such polls are a blight on society. If I had a lot of spare time and absolutely no morals, I'd fight back. →

Dear Roller maintainers. "apos" is NOT a valid HTML entity reference. →

Any idiot can sit down and spend four or seven years of his life writing out his "masterpiece." You do some research, you do some hard work, you get a little help from friends and family, and you get it done. But, it takes a true writing genius (or geniuses, in this case) to create something as original as... →