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Tags > interview
The iPhone: Tricorder Version 1.0?
November 18, 2009
The iPhone, in addition to revolutionizing how people thought about mobile phone user interfaces, also was one of the first devices to offer a suite of sensors measuring everything from the visual environment to position to acceleration, all in a package that could fit in your shirt pocket. On December 3rd, O'Reilly will be offering a one-day online edition of the Where 2.0 conference, focusing on the iPhone sensors, and what you can do with them.
The Minds Behind Some of the Most Addictive Games Around - If you've wasted half your life playing Peggle, Bejeweled, Zuma or Plants vs. Zombies, blame these guys!
November 9, 2009
The gaming industry tends to focus on the high end products, first person shooters that crank out a bazillion polygons a seconds and RPGs which spend more time developing the plot in cut scenes than in actual gameplay. But for every person playing Borderlands, there are scores playing casual games like Bejeweled and Zuma. PopCap Games has been at the forefront of casual game development, with a catalog that includes bestselling titles like Peggle and Plants vs Zombies, in addition to the two previously mentioned. I recently had a chance to talk to Jason Kapalka, one of the founders and the creative director of PopCap. We discussed the evolution of PopCap, how the casual gaming industry differs from mainstream gaming, and the challenges of creating games that can be engaging, without being frustrating.
David Hoover's Top 5 Tips for Apprentices - Finding a Good Mentor is Key
September 29, 2009
If you're a senior developer with years of experience under your belt, it may be hard to remember what it was like coming out of college with a newly minted CS degree, and entering the workplace. But as David Hoover argues, helping these newcomers to the workforce to succeed can be the difference between effective, motivated developers and confused, discouraged ones. Hoover is the author of the new O'Reilly book Apprenticeship Patterns, and he says that people coming right out of college may, in fact, be less motivated than someone who has been working for a while.
Chapter-by-chapter coverage of Masterminds of Programming
September 25, 2009
Programmer Taran Rampersad planned all along to write a review of Masterminds of Programming: Conversations with the Creators of Major Programming Languages -- but his reading impressed him so much he ended up writing a review for each chapter. He brought plenty of personal knowledge about languages to his reading of the book.
Snow Leopard, 10 Days In - No Major Problems, But No Rush to Upgrade Either
September 8, 2009
A week ago last Friday, Apple unleashed Snow Leopard (aka OS X 10.6) on the world. So far, there haven't been many rumblings either way, although the trade press has been generally kind. We thought it might be a good idea to check in with Chris Seibold, author of the upcoming Pocket Guide for Snow Leopard, to get his take on how things have been going.
Augmenting Reality with the iPhone - Acrossair's Nearest Tube will be one of the first "Terminator Vision" applications
August 27, 2009
With the release of the 3.1 iPhone OS, application developers will finally be able to develop augmented reality (AR) apps. In other words, Terminator Vision is right around the corner. I recently talked to Chetan Damani, one of the founders of Acrossair, about their new AR applications, Nearest Tube, and what's involved in developing AR applications for the iPhone.
Tips & Tricks for Living Green - Practical Advice from the Author of "Living Green: The Missing Manual'
August 21, 2009
Nancy Conner, author of the newly released book Living Green: The Missing Manual, has made it her goal to show people just how easy it is to make your everyday lives just a little bit greener. In a recent conversation, we talked about the simple decisions we can all make which make a big difference, as well as some of her favorite tips & tricks from the new book.
How NPR is Embracing Open Source and Open APIs - Daniel Jacobson Will Talk About the NPR Open API at OSCON
July 17, 2009
News providers, like most content providers, are interested in having their content seen by as many people as possible. But unlike many news organizations, whose primary concern may be monetizing their content, National Public Radio is interested in turning it into a resource for people to use in new and novel ways as well. Daniel Jacobson is in charge making that content available to developers and end users in a wide variety of formats, and has been doing so using an Open API that NPR developed specifically for that purpose. Daniel will talk about how the project is going at OSCON next week, here's a preview of what he'll be talking about.
Making Government Transparent Using R - Danese Cooper thinks it will be an important tool in Open Gov
By James TurnerJuly 14, 2009
With Open Source now considered an accepted part of the software industry, some people are starting to wonder if we can't bring the same degree of openness and innovation into government. Danese Cooper, who is actively involved in the open source community through her work with the Open Source Initiative and Apache, as well as working as an R wonk for Revolution Computing, would love to see the government become more open. Part of that openness is being able to access and interpret the mass of data that the government collects, something Cooper thinks R would be a great tool for. She'll be talking about R and Open Government at O'Reilly's Open Source Conference, OSCON.
Sequencing a Genome a Week - Radar Talks to OSCON Speaker David Dooling
July 13, 2009
The Human Genome Project took X years to fully sequence a single human's genetic information. At Washington University's Genome Center, they can now do one in a week. But when you're generating that much data, just keeping track of it can become a major challenge in itself. David Dooling is in charge of managing the massive output of the Center's herd of gene sequencing machines, and making it available to researchers inside the Center and around the world. He'll be speaking at OSCON, O'Reilly's Open Source Conference, on how he uses open source tools to keep things under control, and he agreed to give us an overview of how the field of genomics is evolving.
Jono Bacon on the Value of Good Communities - We need to build good relationships across all of open source.
July 9, 2009
Ubuntu has enjoyed fantastic success over the past few years, becoming one of the dominant Linux distributions, and the distribution of choice for netbooks. Jono Bacon's job is to make sure that that success continues, by keeping the huge Ubuntu developer community happy and productive. We caught up with Jono in advance of his appearance at OSCON, the O'Reilly Open Source Convention, and he was more than happy to talk about the efforts underway to not only improve the Ubuntu community, but also bring together other communities, such as Gnome and KDE, to help them work better together. Jono officially works for Canonical, a company founded by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth for the promotion of Ubuntu and other free software projects.
Patrick Collison Puts the Squeeze on Wikipedia - How to Cram the Wikipedia onto an 8GB iPhone
July 2, 2009
Think about Wikipedia, what some consider the most complete general survey of human knowledge we have at the moment. Now imagine squeezing it down to fit comfortably on an 8GB iPhone. Sound daunting? Well, that's just what Patrick Collison's iPhone application does. App Store purchasers of Collison's open source application can browser and search the full text of Wikipedia when stuck in a plane, or trapped in the middle of nowhere (or as defined by AT&T coverage...) Collison will be presenting a talk on how he did it at OSCON, O'Reilly's Open Source conference at the end of July, and he spent some time talking to me about it recently.
PuffyTron recommends OpenBSD 4.5
June 16, 2009
OpenBSD 4.5 was release on May 1st. I had the privilege to collect some q&a with multiple developers about new features and improvements included in this release.
Walking the Censorship Tightrope with Google's Marissa Mayer
June 16, 2009
Google sometimes finds itself at an difficult crossroad of wanting to make as much information available to as many people as possible, while still trying to obey the laws of the countries they operate in. I recently had a chance to talk to Marissa Mayer, who started at Google as their first female engineer, and has now risen to the ranks of vice president in charge of some of Google's most critical product areas, such as search, maps and Chrome. We talked about some of Google's future product directions, and also about how Google makes the decision as to when information has to be withheld from the users. Marissa will be delivering a keynote address at the O'Reilly Velocity Conference next week.
Velocity Preview - The Greatest Good for the Greatest Number at Microsoft
May 18, 2009
The psychology of engineering user experiences on the web can be difficult. How much rich content can you place up on a page before the load time drives away your visitors? Get the answer wrong, and you can end up with a ghost town; get it right and you're a star. Eric Schurman knows this well, since he is responsible for just those kind of trade-off decisions on some of Microsoft's highest traffic pages. He'll be speaking at O'Reilly's Velocity Conference in June, and he recently talked with us about how Microsoft tests different user experiences on small groups of visitors.
Google Engineering Explains Microformat Support in Searches
May 12, 2009
Today, Google is releasing support for parsing and display of microformat data in their search results. While the initial launch will be limited to a specific set of partners (including LinkedIn, Yelp and CNet reviews), the intent is that very quickly, anyone who marks their pages up with the appropriate microformat data will be able to make their information understandable...
Velocity Preview - Keeping Twitter Tweeting
May 7, 2009
If there's a site that exemplifies explosive growth, it has to be Twitter. It seems like everywhere you look, someone is Tweeting, or talking about Tweeting, or Tweeting about Tweeting. Keeping the site responsive under that type of increase is no easy job, but it's one that John Adams has to deal with every day, working in Twitter Operations. He'll...
Josh Clark on iWork '09: The Missing Manual
May 7, 2009
I recently had a chance to catch up with Josh Clark, author of our newly released iWork '09: The Missing Manual. He had a lot to say about the new version of iWork, as well as a few tips & tricks to share to make the user experience even better.
Where 2.0 Preview - DARPA's TIGR Project Helps Platoons Stay Alive
April 21, 2009
Soldiers on the ground need to know the territory they patrol like the back of their hand. Knowing where insurgents like to plant IEDs or that an important political leader lives in a certain house can prove the difference between success and failure. But what happens when a platoon transfers out of Baghdad and a brand new one moves in? All that experience used to go out the window. But thanks to TIGR, a map-based knowledge-base developed by DARPA, platoons can now document information they learn on patrol, as well as accessing the latest intelligence. In this interview, hear how TIGR was developed, how it is helping troops stay alive and perform their missions better, and what the realities of deploying a brand new technology into a war zone are.
Where 2.0 Preview - Building the SENSEable City
April 16, 2009
A lot of information we have about cities comes through direct and intentioned observation and study, but could a lot of the time and expense spent on this research be garnered just as well by mining the data that citizens generate in their day-to-day lives through cell phone traffic and internet usage? That's one of the questions that Andrea Vaccari, a research associate at the MIT SENSEable City Lab, is trying to find out. Andrea will be speaking at the Where 2.0 Conference in May on the research that the SENSEable City Project is doing.
Where 2.0 Preview - Tyler Bell on Yahoo's Open Location Project
April 15, 2009
Location can be a vague concept to pin down. To a surveyor, location means latitude and longitude accurate to a few millimeters, while to a cab driver, a street address would be much more useful. If you're German, I can tell you that I live in the United States. To a Californian, I live in New Hampshire. And to someone from Manchester, I live in Derry. Unfortunately, the way that location is currently stored and presented online is both non-uniform and frequently at a level of precision inappropriate for the end-user. That's part of what Open Location is trying to fix. Tyler Bell, who took his doctorate from Oxford to Yahoo, is currently the product lead for the Yahoo Geo Technology Group. At O'Reilly's Where 2.0 Conference, he'll be discussing Open Location.
Stallman discusses Free Software and GPLv3
By Federico BiancuzziApril 14, 2009
On June 29, 2007 the Free Software Foundation released the GNU General Public License, version 3. What happened since then? I had the opportunity to discuss many subjects with FSF's founder and president Richard Stallman. This interview explores Stallman's views on a range of topics including the relationship between GNU and Linux, U.S. laws around software patents and the major initiatives of the Free Software movement.
Where 2.0 Preview - Pelago's Jeff Holden on Creating Stories Out of Your Life
April 10, 2009
Tools like Twitter and Facebook have let people share in near real-time what they are doing. Now with a new generation of location aware mobile devices, you can tell your friends or the entire world where you're doing it. Jeff Holden's company, Pelago, is one of many trying to come up with a killer application that blends location, images, text and social networking to create a new kind of group awareness. Before starting Pelago, Jeff had a long career as the Senior Vice President of Consumer Websites for Amazon and before that, the Director of Supply Chain Optimization Systems. In this preview of his talk at Where 2.0, Jeff talks about creating stories through location-tagged information, distributing software through Apple's App Store, his work at Amazon, and the privacy implications of location becoming ubiquitous.
Where 2.0 Preview: Eric Gunderson of Development Seed on the Promise of Open Data
April 3, 2009
When we think about how government uses geographic information, we tend to think about USGS maps or census data, very centralized and preplanned projects meant to produce a very specific set of products. But Development Seed believes that there are a lot more that could be done if these types of data could be mashed up easily with each other as well as with alternate sources such as social networks. Eric Gunderson, President of Development Seed, will speaking at O'Reilly's Where 2.0 Conference in June, and he recently took some time to speak to us about the potential benefits that open access to government data brings.
Bryan O'Sullivan on the Power of Haskell
By chromaticJanuary 16, 2009
In 15 years, Haskell has gone from an academic, research-only language to a language usable for real world programs. Real World Haskell co-author Bryan O'Sullivan reflects on the changes in the language and its community when enable the rest of us to stretch our minds as we write software in the real world.
John Goerzen on Why You Should Learn Haskell
By chromaticJanuary 16, 2009
Haskell can be a mind-bending language to learn, if you come from a procedural/OO mindset. It's worth the work, according to Real World Haskell co-author John Goerzen. The concepts of purity, laziness, and type safety can help you write better software in whatever language you use.
Seeing New Possibilities in Existing Technologies: An Interview with April Allderdice of MicroEnergy Credits
January 13, 2009
This interview is with April Allderdice, CEO and cofounder of MicroEnergy Credits. MicroEnergy Credits has developed a mechanism using microfinance institutions and GPS cell phones to allow carbon credits to reach small households in the developing world. Until now the relatively high transaction costs involved in set up and verification of a carbon trade has made the market available...
The Evolution of Python 3
By chromaticJanuary 10, 2009
The Python core developers released Python 3.0 in December 2008, following closely behind Python 2.6. Python creator Guido van Rossum generously agreed to discuss the present and future of the popular programming language, as well as the history of the Python 3.0 revision.
Open Source, Community and Audiobooks: Q&A with LibriVox Founder Hugh McGuire
By Mac SlocumNovember 6, 2008
LibriVox is a volunteer effort with a big goal: record audiobook editions for every title in the public domain. In this Q&A, LibriVox founder Hugh McGuire discusses the project's beginnings, the organic development of the LibriVox community, and the distinctions (or lack thereof) between "professional" and "amateur" efforts.
How Techies Can Improve Democracy and Governance
By chromaticOctober 29, 2008
Silona Bonewald is an established technologist as well as an experienced political consultant who believes that well-designed and well-applied technology can improve communication, transparency, and governance in political systems -- and state legislators are listening. Here's how you can help her improve democracy.
What developers should know about IP
By Kathryn BarrettAugust 14, 2008
Author Van Lindberg is both software engineer and practicing attorney. His new book, Intellectual Property and Open Source tackles the slippery subject of intellectual property. In this interview, Van explains why intellectual property law is so important to developers—any developers—and
How to Write Your Own Facebook Applications
By Mary RotmanAugust 14, 2008
I recently had a chance to ask Jesse Stay, author of FBML Essentials a few questions about his book and just why it's so important right now. His book revolves around the fundamentals of the Facebook Markup Language--Facebook's version of HTML--which makes it easy to develop applications specifically for Facebook. If you can think of a niche that hasn't yet been filled in the Facebook application world, but don't quite know how to build one yourself, then this book is for you. Keep reading to see why Jesse wrote this book, as well as how you can win your own copy of this essential reference.
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