mdoar

Yes for inoreader. Not free, but works well for me

Jira and its schemes

Data center and server are the same bits using a different license. Moving from server to a one node data center Jira is not hard

Me too. RSS is the way to absorb lots of information

Jira is pretty flexible, so it could be used for priorities and goals as well as bug tracking

It's a life lesson. You won't make that mistake again. No contract? No recourse really

If it's more than 100 hours work you might think about legal action. Less than 100 hours perhaps pull a face when other people mention the company and tell the story off the record, definitely not recorded. The company's reputation will come back to affect them

What about the locale of the user producing a different sort order?

> Stick to your existing employer. This event might be > embarrassing but everyone will get over it.

I agree. Once a company has made the offer, it's not illegal to withdraw it, but it certainly shows a lack of organization and a scummy level of honesty. Next time you want to jump, have the new company pay for moving costs and immigration lawyer fees up front. That should stop them being such jerks again.

I make a clear distinction between estimates and formal quotes. I almost never exceed a quote. I also much prefer to charge by the hour instead of fixed bids.

University of Cambridge

Yes, I think this is the answer. There are two choices, so being human, we chose both. Then eventually chose one of those two. I used to have an email address jmsd@uk.ac.cam.cl i.e. with the domains reversed.

~Matt

Ran out of space when I tried it with a Project Gutenberg text. Also, seemed slower than advertised at the upper rates?

Doubt it, but then I'm not holding my breath for a personal helicopter either.

Do it, because you'll not get time to do five years from now, and you might even meet someone who'll want you for a job. Just don't expect to necessarily return from it.

~Matt (met my wife while travelling and ended up in the USA)

emacs, 20 years, nothing else comes close

I subscribe to many blogs that cover my technical interests and a few personal ones. I avoid blogs with adverts or that are set up to make money. I generally use an RSS reader to follow these blogs (and Twitter and other sources).

For about 8 years now we've had a TV but no live reception, which means DVDs, videos, but no adverts. Works well for me.

Perhaps a more balanced approach is to ask "What tools do you use? What do you like and dislike about them?". The choice of tools tells me something about a how a person does their job, any job.

3, and that's why I just rented an office instead of working at home.

For wry laughs, go to Frys in Sunnyvale at lunch time and watch for about 30 minutes. You'll see employees with minimal technical knowledge (but lots of self confidence) being reeducated about the products they sell by the guys who actually created the products, who are visiting the store to look at their own offspring.

I get funny looks for using emacs for Java work, but it loads and runs fast on all the different platforms I work on. I have used and support people using Eclipse, and generally I like the ability to find definitions etc, but the refactoring rarely proves essential. As for autocompletion, if you can't hold the whole core language in your head, there's something wrong somewhere ;-)

I charge what I need to cover paying for a family in Silicon Valley. So my rates now start at $175/hour for version control (Subversion, CVS, Mercurial), build systems (SCons mainly), bug trackers (JIRA) and anything else by Atlassian. Business ranges from steady to brisk. And it's certainly varied.

I evaluated Django, TurboGears and Pylons for a new-from-scratch application of medium complexity (10K lines Python, 4 different databases). Pylons seemed to use a number of other tools well, had an excellent book and helpful community, so I went with Pylons. Turned out fine for my app.

I use similar apps, plus emacs. I switched about a year ago and have been happy with VMWare, though you do need to max out your RAM. Swapping can take a few seconds sometimes. I use a Mac Mini plus double-angle keyboard and external monitors bigger than any laptop screen. I wouldn't go back.