For my final year project, I knew I wanted to write some kind of software, and my Programming Languages professor suggested that I pick a generic topic like "A program in C++" and then I can build whatever.
This was at a time when we just started using mobile data (GPRS) on our phones and SMS was very expensive. It's also when I met my girlfriend, now wife, and we were constantly messaging of course.
I needed a cheaper way to communicate. This was before there was WhatsApp, Signal, etc.
So I wrote Tiruriru. It consisted of:
- a Java mobile application that you could use to send messages to your contacts over GPRS
- a GSM modem written in Python that would call and ring the contact's phone number 3 times when you send a message to them because no one was connected to GPRS at all times
- and finally a REST api written in C++ with Wt Toolkit that was communicating with the app and the GSM modem service.
Since this used very little data it was 10x cheaper to send messages like this than to use SMS. We ended up upgrading to Android phones soon after and 2g/3g/wifi was available everywhere.
That's the story of how I wrote "A program in C++" in high school :)
Only if by fundamentals you mean the fundamental idea behind coworking spaces. Sure, that makes sense. But the WeWork company fundamentals are out of whack. Nobody is arguing that coworking spaces are a bad idea. WeWork is a company that turns 2$ into 1$.
I would offer another anecdote because I really believe this to be a very high quality laptop. I have bought my Dell XPS13 9360 around the same time and have never been happier with a laptop (running Fedora flawlessly, 10 hours of battery). And it cost me around 1250€ (~1420 USD).
I've seen extreme programming work well in some situations, but I've seen it not work in some others...
In my current project we're three people: the owner, front-end dev and back-end dev. We don't really have a methodology other than having a daily call at the same time every day and discuss what needs to be done and any issues we're having. We also have Slack and if there's something urgent we jump on a call. I would say it's worked well so far.
But IMO with smaller teams it's way easier than with larger teams.
I'm also using Dell XPS 13 (model 9360, non-touch, 1080p screen) with Fedora 26, and I haven't had any issues. This is by far the best linux laptop I've had. Just another data point in case someone is looking into buying these.
Linux on laptops is like a disease. It's rare that everyone gets sick, but it's bad enough that many do. Even at Red Hat, where the employees collectively know more than anyone about making Linux run on laptops, internal mailing lists were often full of gripes about issues. If it wasn't the Big Three that I already mentioned, it was fans running constantly and batteries being sucked dry, switching monitor resolutions or dis/connecting a second monitor leaving things in a weird state, the utter impossibility of getting trackpads to work as well as they did under Windows/MacOS, international keyboard layouts not behaving properly, camera remaining locked when it shouldn't, and so on and so on ad nauseam. If you never hit any of these then good for you, but I can say with absolute confidence that such an experience is exceptional.
> I mainly regret not taking university seriously half a lifetime ago, but as a result I became a lifelong self-learner.
Can you please expand on this? Why do you regret that?
I've read a great book about this topic: The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. It's a bit more general of course, but it might be interesting to you or others.
Well, I'm hoping that even if I went to uni that I would have still become a lifelong learner because I'm naturally curious and a bit cynical. Believing that I would have come to the same conclusion in life, having a uni degree in my back pocket would have made me feel a lot better about myself all through my 20s and some of my 30s. Like when applying for jobs in a specific field instead of taking service jobs, growing my professional abilities in said field, having a regular paycheck.
For my final year project, I knew I wanted to write some kind of software, and my Programming Languages professor suggested that I pick a generic topic like "A program in C++" and then I can build whatever.
This was at a time when we just started using mobile data (GPRS) on our phones and SMS was very expensive. It's also when I met my girlfriend, now wife, and we were constantly messaging of course.
I needed a cheaper way to communicate. This was before there was WhatsApp, Signal, etc.
So I wrote Tiruriru. It consisted of:
- a Java mobile application that you could use to send messages to your contacts over GPRS - a GSM modem written in Python that would call and ring the contact's phone number 3 times when you send a message to them because no one was connected to GPRS at all times - and finally a REST api written in C++ with Wt Toolkit that was communicating with the app and the GSM modem service.
Since this used very little data it was 10x cheaper to send messages like this than to use SMS. We ended up upgrading to Android phones soon after and 2g/3g/wifi was available everywhere.
That's the story of how I wrote "A program in C++" in high school :)