
Getting Started with Swift, For NON-Apple Devs
This past weekend I attempted to get started with Swift coding. Since I have not been an Apple Developer for a while, it wasn’t immediately obvious how to get started. But once I fumbled around a few minutes I realized I needed a developer account to get the latest XCode. Jeez, it really shows how […]

That Was Fun, Done With The Lenovo Carbon X1, Back to GSD!
Over the last couple of months I’ve been double laptoping it. I’ve had a Lenovo Carbon X1 with Windows 8 and Ubuntu dual boot configuration with 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD and i7 and I had a Mac Book Air (MBA) 8GB, 512GB SSD and i7 Proc. The MBA was my primary work machine with the […]

Thor Project Opens Up, Building the Cloud Foundry Ecosystem with the Community
The Iron Foundry Team are big advocates of open source software. We write code across all sorts of languages, just like many of the development shops out there do. Sometimes we’re heavy on the .NET, other times we’re all up in some Java, Ruby on Rails, spooling up a Node.js Application or something else. So …

Thor Brings the Hamma! Cloud Foundry OS-X, Windows 7 and Windows 8 Interfaces FTW!
One of the things that I do in my work is lead the efforts around creating and leading open source projects. As regular readers may know, I’m big into open source efforts, especially around PaaS. My preferred PaaS offering these days for internal, external and public cloud PaaS is Cloud Foundry (with Iron Foundry for …

Macbook Air Multiple Monitor Support
The Macbook Air is indeed an “insanely great” device. I have slammed this thing around, physically and virtually, from the bicycle messenger bag situation described in my buying decision post, all the way to running multiple virtual machines and multiple monitors! This machine, of course if you’re using lean, clean, powerful, and intelligent built software, […]

Small, Powerful, Elegant, Sexy, and Hard Core
Ok, it’s that time of the year and I’m at the phase of the cycle when it is computer purchasing time. What do I want, what do I need, who has the best options available? In order of priority here’s my wish list for the ideal machine.
It must be able to run Windows & Linux. Even better would be the ability to run OS-X, Windows, and Linux. Preferably with Linux or OS-X as the core operating system and Windows either virtualized or dual booted.
Another high priority is I want elegant, sexy, and strong design. But not just in appearance but in functionality too. I want the device to be strong. I want the material to be fabricated well, I want the quality and durability to be built into the device. This comes down to the device being a single mold, probably of a high quality material like aluminum.
I want as much oomph as I can get out of the hardware. Demanding elegant and sexy usually dictates it won’t be powerful. Demanding tough is usually another strike against that.
Another thing which is super important, but I may be flexible on, is the resolution. I simply want as much resolution as possible.
The last thing, which isn’t as important, is I don’t really want to pay more than about $1500. I’d be all the happier if I can find something for even less.
Narrowing Down the Machines… (click through to read the entire article)

OS-X, Top 2 Gripes
I’ve been developing in my spare time on Mac OS-X using Rubymine, Webstorm, TextMate, XCode, and several other apps. I’ve also been using Kindle (the native app and the HTML5 Version), Tweetdeck, and a host of other applications. A bulk of things I’ve also been using, however they’re almost entirely in Chrome/HTML5 or some web […]

Mac Battles, The Personal Day to Day of Software Development and Morale
I’ve been using a Mac for a couple of months now. My employer purchased a few for us coders to try out, and I’ve become spoiled. I rarely want to use my other machines now, as they seem cumbersome and inefficient. Mainly from a hardware perspective, as the OS itself seems to have plusses and […]