My Posts

Why? Not no

One of my favourite podcasts is Hanselminutes by Scott Hanselman. I have been listening to it probably longer than any other podcast. He recently interviewed Roberta Arcoverde from Stack Overflow. She talked about how the architecture of the Stack Overflow site is very different from most other large sites in that it is a self hosted monolithic application.


Read More

So what do you do?

It is a classic way people start a conversation. Some people meet, they exchange a few pleasantries and then they ask “and, so what do you do?” And each person then takes turns, hopefully if someone doesn’t just keep talking, explaining what their job is.


Read More

Getting quieter to get louder

Austin Kleon wrote an article about how we can get used to anything. Something is new and exciting but before too long it becomes the normal and we are no longer excited by it. It seems to be part of our nature.


Read More

High value low engagement versus high engagement low value apps

Most mobile apps, and websites to an extent, seem to be driven by how much they can get the end user to use or engage with them; the more usage the better.


Read More

Work in 2030

There are two camps of people where I work; those who want to return to the office and those who want to remain working remotely. The former group tend to be those whose work involves spending most of the day talking to people (the “business” side of the company). The latter group tend to be those whose work is mostly focussed around thinking - or have family and enjoy the balance this approach affords. I fall into the latter camp on both counts.


Read More

Future proofing

It is always tempting when buying or designing things to plan for the future; to add features that make your design or purchase “future proof”.


Read More

How to fix Sony Bravia/Sonos sound stops working

We have a Sony Bravia television connected to a Sonos Beam which in turn is linked to a couple of Sonos Ones. They have been working fine for quite a while but suddenly lost sound.


Read More

Capturing memories

A PhD student has created a way to capture conversations with hospice patients that their relatives can play back and listen to at any time later.


Read More

Preparation meets opportunity

Another podcast … I was listening to Guy Raz interview General David Petraeus on the “Wisdom from the top” podcast. Towards the end he made the observation that luck is where preparation meets opportunity. This implies the more prepared you are then the more “lucky” you will be when opportunities arise.


Read More

Installing a payphone

This is quite an amazing article about how someone ended up installing an actual old style payphone in their house.


Read More