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Automating your IPython Notebook Setup (and getting launchctl to work) 18 Aug 2013 | 07:15 am
Recently I've fallen in love with the IPython Notebook. It's the Python REPL on steroids and I've probably just scratched the surface of what it can actually do. This will be a short post because long...
Speeding up test runs by 81% and 13 minutes 13 Aug 2013 | 08:50 pm
Yesterday I sped up our unit/integration test runs from 16 minutes to 3 minutes. I thought I'd share the techniques I used during this process. We had a hunch that an un-mocked network call was takin...
Eliminating more trivial inconveniences 1 Jun 2013 | 11:22 pm
I really enjoyed Sam Saffron's post about eliminating trivial inconveniences in his development process. This resonated with me as I tend to get really distracted by minor hiccups in the development p...
Disability benefits: the new unemployment checks 28 Mar 2013 | 12:09 pm
This American Life is an excellent podcast, but occasionally puts out episodes on subjects I don't care for - fiction, reminisces about home life, etc. There is one heuristic you should use for filter...
It begins 15 Mar 2013 | 08:30 am
Email from my alma mater: Dear Members of the Claremont McKenna College Community, I am writing to update you on an important action taken by the Board of Trustees at its meeting on March 9, 2013. I...
Submit forms using Javascript without breaking the Internet, a short guide 17 Feb 2013 | 09:51 am
Do you write forms on the Internet? Are you planning to send them to your server with Javascript? You should read this. The One-Sentence Summary It's okay to submit forms with Javascript. Just don't...
Helping Beginners Get HTML Right 12 Feb 2013 | 11:50 pm
If you've ever tried to teach someone HTML, you know how hard it is to get the syntax right. It's a perfect storm of awfulness. Newbies have to learn all of the syntax, in addition to the names of HT...
Designing a better shower faucet 10 Feb 2013 | 10:01 am
How should you design the controls for a shower? Let's take a quick look. Affordance A device should make clear by its design how to use it. Take a hammer for example. No one has ever looked at a h...
How to design your API SDK 29 Jan 2013 | 10:24 pm
I've worked with Twilio's client libraries pretty much every day for the last year and I wanted to share some of the things we've learned about helper libraries. Should you have helper libraries? Yo...
How to talk to recruiters at a career fair 8 Nov 2012 | 06:09 am
Last week two other Twilio engineers and I went to the Columbia engineering career fair. We had a great time and talked to a lot of really smart people. However I was surprised at some of the naive mi...
