Open Source Bridge 2012 epilogue


I had a good time at OSB this year. But I enjoyed it more in past years, and I'd say that this year was good, but not great. In terms of focus and information, OSB is geared for projects first and technology second. Most of the talks are about the psychology, logistics, mechanics, or organization … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2012 epilogue

Open Source Bridge 2012, day 4


The Unconference day... Pro tip: For pure shock value, nothing can beat sitting in a talk and having it slowly dawn on you that the speaker married someone you knew in High School, eons and eons ago. Jeepers, that was odd. In the morning, Puppet. I've absorbed enough Puppetry via osmosis that I'll probably use it instead … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2012, day 4

Open Source Bridge 2012, day 3


Open-source processes for security vulnerabilities: The speaker works for ISC, and the talk focused on a different software level than what I usually work on. But I still pulled some pearls from it, such as security bug classification, and security vulnerability terminology. Privacy and Security: The speaker works for Mozilla Labs, to which I had … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2012, day 3

Sometimes Text should lack Empathy


Yesterday's "Text Lacks Empathy" talk got me thinking about the times when I've put others on the spot. Sometimes empathy is overrated. Sometimes it's a waste of time, and sometimes it's wrong. There's a time and place to pin someone's ears back against their head and clean their clock. It can be very productive to … Continue reading Sometimes Text should lack Empathy

Open Source Bridge 2012, day 2


Not sure I'll listen to today's keynote. Update: Nope, I didn't go to the keynote. How not to Release Software: My warp engines are finally on-line. A good talk. It was oriented, not surprisingly given the conference at which it was being given, toward web sites/servers/applications. Holy crap, there are two Mozilla projects still maintained … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2012, day 2

Open Source Bridge 2012, day 1


Yadda yadda yadda. Live post. You know the drill. Nginx: I've been an Apache httpd user since FSM knows when. I've never been persuaded by artificial benchmarks. I don't worry about small front-end inefficiencies when the application spends gobs of back-end time talking to other servers. It's more important to use a front-end technology that … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2012, day 1

In Portland for OSB 2012


I'll do a live-post each day with bits about the talks and goings-ons. I met Amye for Happy Hour at the hotel where I'm staying. Because I was in a "Mad Men" state of mind, I had two Old Fashioneds. I am the Don Draper of my world.  

Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 4 Liveblog


1530: Closing ceremony, conference feedback, etc. Lots of chatting. Spirits are high. Lots of commentary. I'm sure the Open Source Bridge staff will be sifting through them (and the online survey forms) for a few weeks. 1422: couchdbkit or couchdb-python? 1304: Pasta and meatballs that were quasi-Italian. Then back to CouchDB. 1205: I've successfully built … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 4 Liveblog

Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 3 Liveblog


1545: Keeping Agile at the Heart of the Internet,Larissa Shapiro. This turns out to be a Scrum overview. Not what I expected. 1430: Data Warehousing 101, Josh Berkus. "Big data" is relative to contemporary typical commercial data sizes. Archiving: WORN data. Usually needed for regulatory compliance, and has very liberal response time requirements. Data mining: … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 3 Liveblog

Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 2 Liveblog


1900: Guided Tour of IRC, Peter Fein. This promises to be a treat, listening to he of Telecomix renown. Hmm, should I use Colloquy or Snak on OS X? We venture onto the Telecomix IRC server. Then we venture onto AnonNet. Ooooo! 1545: Testing Antipatterns, Matt Robinson. Not running tests often enough. Not fixing broken tests before … Continue reading Open Source Bridge 2011: Day 2 Liveblog