Giving Programmers Real World Solutions

Interviewing Programmers

Aaron Bono — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 18:40:00 GMT

Recently I had a client ask me about an article that claimed 99.5% of programmers they interviewed couldn't even write a few lines of simple code.His question: "From your experience, how true is this article"While finding good people who can do what they say they can do is very difficult, the article exaggerated a lot. If someone is testing programmers and 99.5% of them fail the basics, they must be doing something drastically wrong in their pre-screening process. Those people should never have made it to that point in the interview process.If you have kept up with American ...

Software Development: Why is it Such a Mystery?

Aaron Bono — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 18:00:00 GMT

When tackling a software project, most people have difficulty grasping exactly what needs to be done and how they are to go about doing it. Software is intangible. It is hard to see the inner workings, the bits and bytes floating through computer chips and making things work. We see the user interface but that only gives us a minute glimpse into what it really takes to make computer programs go.

The same could probably be said about a building. There are all sorts of things going on that we do not ...

The 5 Most Important Things Programmers Should Know (but never learn in school)

Aaron Bono — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 20:00:00 GMT

Over the years of leading software engineering teams, I have had the opportunity to interview students from a number of schools and at a variety of levels of education from associates degree up to PhD. The one commonality I have found is that all of these students lack the essential knowledge of 5 topics that should be at the top of their academic curriculum.

It dumbfounds me that these topics are not taught in school. I have mentioned it to numerous individuals over the years and have finally decided to list the items here ...

Being a Leader in Your Industry

Aaron Bono — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:10:00 GMT

What is the best way to strangle your business to death? Hording knowledge and over concern about protecting your intellectual property could be sending your business down the road to destruction.

Standards for Success

Aaron Bono — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 17:27:00 GMT

Over the years, it has amazed me how people respond when talking about standards... Some people love them. Some people hate them. So who's right?

It's an IT Revolution

Aaron Bono — Wed, 19 Jul 2006 18:50:00 GMT

Developers love their toys and they love to innovate. But if you are not careful, those developers can suck the financial life our of your business forcing you to OVER SPEND on technology while feeding your employees need to play with their toys. So how to you balance the business's need for cost effective solutions while keeping your staff happy and productive?

Error Handling - Ignore, Hide or Run Away

Aaron Bono — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 01:17:00 GMT

Are you a super programmer who never has bugs? Well if you, like me, are a mere mortal and have to worry about error handling, I have some great techniques for you here that will help you spend less time hunting down and squashing bugs and more time coding that cool new killer app.

Java Logging Made Easy

Aaron Bono — Tue, 20 Jun 2006 02:36:00 GMT

Writing to standard out and standard error should be banned from the classroom. There is a better way and learning it up front when you are first learning to program will teach you best practices that will be with you your whole career.