The more I use my new iPad, the more I notice non-retina graphics. We’re spoiled by the many native apps with retina graphics, that when we browse the web, it feels like a second class citizen. It doesn’t have to. This problem isn’t going away, either. I bet we’ll start seeing retina displays in MacBooks pretty soon, and maybe even glorious 27″ retina cinema displays, too. But, even with just the iPhone 4, 4S and new iPad, we’ve got a lot of devices receiving subpar content. Let’s fix that.
SD Times – Software engineering: Art or science?
I was recently interviewed for an SD Times article about the role of art and science in software development.
Chris Gunther, cofounder and developer at Room 118 Solutions, agreed with Jacobson.
“I believe software development is not an art, but rather a craft as it is ultimately defined by its ability to solve a need for an end user,” he said. “Beautifully written code doesn’t count for much when it fails to solve the needs of the end user, and vice versa; poorly written code will have little negative effect on the end user when it successfully solves their needs.
“I think the craft side of software development becomes more of a necessity when working alongside other developers. Code that clearly reflects the domain model and is well organized becomes self-documenting and allows fellow developers to collaborate and understand the domain much easier.”
Gunther believed that science plays a role in development, but mainly due to the experiments used to find the perfect combination of code and the fact that developers are always building on top of older theories and ideas.
RVM/Capistrano: rvm-shell not found
If you’re trying to deploy with Capistrano to a server you just set up, and it fails with an error like this:
rvm-shell: No such file or directory
Then you probably have a newer version of RVM on your new server than on your development machine. Update RVM and go on your way. Hope this saves someone some frustration!
Jim
Stubbing Paperclip During Testing
For those of you working with the wonderful paperclip gem, you probably know how slow it can make your test suite. Hitting the FS in every test that creates an object that requires an attachment is slow and unnecessary. Here’s what we’re doing to keep Paperclip from actually saving any files we pass to it:
Read on
Styling Print Headers and Footers With CSS
Last week I was tasked with porting a couple of reports for a client from Crystal Reports to HTML/CSS, so I thought I’d document my trials here. Luckily because this was running on a server and the printing was initiated on the server side, I was able to focus just on one browser (Internet Explorer 8) rather than ensuring wide cross-browser compatibility. Read on
Our Small-Business-In-The-Cloud Boilerplate – Part II: Internal
This is the second half of my series on the services we use here at Room 118 to operate efficiently and entirely in the cloud. If you missed Part I, check it out for a list of services we use to interact with our customers. Now, on to Part II, the services we use internally to manage our business.
Ubuntu 10.10 Server + GRUB + GPT Partitions
So, I ran into a peculiar problem while trying to get my homebuilt 4TB NAS up and running last night. I bought two 2TB SATA drives, and sourced everything else from my old computer boneyard (i.e. my closet). The issue I was having was the Ubuntu 10.10 Server installer kept failing when trying to install GRUB. I eventually tracked this down to an issue installing GRUB to GPT partitions (GRUB requires a BIOS boot partition). Since I’m running a small 5GB partition in RAID1 for Ubuntu, and the rest of the disks (~4TB) in RAID0, I’m exceeding the partition size limitations of MBR, and thus need to use GPT. Fine. The issue is that the Ubuntu installer seems to be unaware of how to handle this situation. Long story short, here’s what you need to do when yours fails:
Our Small-Business-In-The-Cloud Boilerplate – Part I: External
When Chris and I formed Room 118 Solutions one year ago, we didn’t really know how we were going to run a business from our home offices. We didn’t even know what was involved in running a corporation (an S-corp, to be exact), from a business perspective. Over this past year, we’ve fallen into a nice groove using a combination of web applications that has made everything from collaboration to running payroll a breeze. We’d like to share them with you, as they mostly apply to all small business teams. In Part I, I’ll cover services we use to work with customers; in Part II, I’ll cover services we use internally. Read on
Happy 1st Birthday!
Today marks one full year of business as Room 118 Solutions and it’s been an awesome ride. We’ve made some great friends, worked on awesome projects and expanded our skill sets. Here’s to another amazing year.
In celebration of one year in business, we thought its about time we started blogging, so welcome to the inaugural post and keep an eye out for more to come in the future.
Chris & Jim