I've been a developer for over 10 years and I can say that in most environments, there is a divide between tech and the rest of the company in almost every situation.

If you're struggling to communicate with other devs or your supervisor, that's a different issue.

First, an agile process, where you define user stories and commit to work in sprints, is a great communication method that integrates with your work flow. From a top level, you define the business need, then breaking it down with tasks being more technically oriented. This adds a great deal of transparency and gives the business side something written in their language that they can review and track.

I've found that my personal communication issues stem from getting too caught up in substantiating everything. As a developer, there is a highly technical, logical discourse that can be had about anything you work on. Knowing how to communicate this simply, for non-technical employees, goes a long way, but can be a challenge. When I see someone getting lost in my words, I take a step back and give that individual control of the conversation. Then, I work with that person to help them understand the topic at-hand in a more constructive way.

The other thing is, remember to listen... take notes during conversations and don't just wait for your chance to speak. Communication is really about simply finding a shared perspective to explore.

The golden rule is that technology supports the business, not the other way around.

I wonder if it bothers the people responsible for the antidepressant study that someone seeking help for depression was given placebos and tried to commit suicide. What if he chose a more effective method?

This person, a so-called 'refugee' from Facebook, is full of it. I mean, she left Facebook to write a 'tell-all' about Facebook under the guise that she left the company to get away from it? Yeah, that does't resonate at all with me.

Let me preface the rest of my comment by saying, I am not a supporter of Facebook. I am a software engineer, I have a Facebook I seldom use and keep private, I eagerly await Facebook's inevitable decline.

Her book and perspective do not help anyone but herself and her 'career'. My takeaway is that she wasn't trusted and bitterly did what would be expected of a disgruntled writer... she wrote about her previous employer for personal gain. Its a good thing she left technology behind because no one in the industry should trust her after this.

Her point revolves around the 'problem' with Facebook being rooted with users and not Facebook as a technology or communication method. Basically, all I hear is her calling users 'stupid'.

The reality of the situation is this... Facebook is where the users are, so its where the money is. If history repeats itself (which it does), Facebook will inevitably meet its end the same way other communication and social platforms have historically gone (pagers, aol, Friendster, Myspace, RIM et al.), when users leave for another platform or technology.

The problem with Facebook is that it exploits users, rather than empower them. Sure, that's a sweeping statement, but its the truth. Their features exist merely as a way to proliferate user data for the purpose of advertising. It is this trend in the industry that's the problem and Facebook isn't alone. Its also the symptom of a company with an ad-hoc business model, something investors have been critical about long before they went public and the single largest reason why they can't figure out how to make mobile profitable.

Its easy to pick at problems with something (a product, solution, situation), but its something else entirely to find solutions. She's seems so focused on the problems with Facebook and her conclusion is "I'll use it again, but with caution".

She had an opportunity to make a tremendous difference in the Facebook culture and platform, instead she plays the victim and proclaims (with heavy overtones of self-righteousness) that Facebook isn't the answer to... what? The human condition? Her career? (I'm honestly not sure what the question even is that she's trying to answer)

Well no kidding, technology has a shelf-life and exists as a step, bridging the gap to the next 'thing'. Facebook is no exception. One thing I do know for certain is that whatever the next thing is, she will play no part in it with her uninspired, defeatist perspective and that's the one good thing I got from this article.

I've been working with Drupal for a couple years now. Even experienced PHP developers will find themselves in a learning curve in using Drupal's administrative "backend" and third party modules.

An experienced PHP developer also realizes the value and importance of online documentation... php.net is a resource I still constantly refer to when certain decisions need to get made...

Whenever I see a Drupal-related book, I immediately compare it to drupal.org, the advanced help module and the information a simple google search can produce.

A developer's time learning fundamental Drupal concepts would be better served through diving into the Drupal community... not reading a book... That way they're prepared to find resources for all the various issues that come up with Drupal Development... not just adding multimedia.

A would like to see a book written from the perspective of a Web programmer evaluating Drupal as a development (MVC) framework weighed against the likes of cakePHP, Zend, codeigniter, et al.

Its been a topic of debate lately and a book would be a good medium to thoroughly evaluate such an idea.

A book like that would help the Drupal Community... I feel like the book you described hurts it.

If this is saying that after using Windows 7, I'll miss Windows Vista, when I never liked Vista, what does that say about Windows 7?

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=munge

My favorite definition of Munge:

"Munging is the act in which one jumps on the stomach of a dead corpse and eating through fallatio the embalming fluids which erupt out of the corpse in the jumping process. "

lolz! =31337 k-rad hax0r 4ut|-|0r?

Oh how i wish the author liked lolcode instead.

HAI
Can Has GAME DESIGN In Mah BOOK?
Gimmeh ATOMS
I Has a UI Itz a ATOM
I Has A POWER-UP Itz a ATOM
I Has a CONFLICTS Itz a ATOM

LOL UI In Mah Bukkit R CONFLICTS

YOU Seez "my opinion"

KTHXBYE

I don't understand why the author calls the foundational elements of game design atoms... I mean.. logically, an atom in this context would imply the simplest, well-formed concepts of game design that cannot be broken down any further. Concepts like "UI, inventory, power-ups, puzzles, conflicts" are generally abstract and can most certainly be broken down or interpreted differently. So, if the author needs a catchy buzzword label to define the content elements of his book... why choose a word that has scientific, logical and mathematical meaning? Meaning that conflicts with the intended meaning this label is supposed to define.

"A transit shift of this magnitude may indicate that something (administrative, or physical) has affected Iran's connection to the submarine cables running east and west â" not a total outage, but some kind of significant impairment." well yea that sounds like an authoritative manipulation to me. Tensions mounting with both N.Korea and Iran (nevermind China for now), an borderline economic crisis, an over extended U.S. military in a war with no possible positive outcome except for the exploitation of a people and their natural resources (oh, and the positioning of a "true" democracy in the middle east that will never take form). Meanwhile U.S. politicians can barely appease their sensationalist media, let alone the citizens, who all want something for nothing, even if it means taking from the person next to them. I consider myself a pretty rational and calm individual. I served honorably in the U.S. military, I went to college and have a good paying job and a comfortable life. Am I the irrational one to say that that I feel stuck in a leaderless situation, part of a hopelessly flawed system of systems that is doomed to fail and spiraling out of any form of regulation or control? Am I wrong to think that reform alone cannot fix a fundamental flaw in the various infrastructures that make up our country? Am I the only one that sees mass panic growing in a nation full of self-serving ignorant hedonists, who would like nothing more than to pretend like 'this' (or that) isn't happening? Perhaps I should just post some pictures of cute fluffy animals, watch my favorite tv shows on-demand, spend more money on entertainment, food and libations, regurgitate my superficial knowledge of the issues as seen on tv, dance and sing and skip because tomorrow is a bright, new day. Or maybe I can quasi-involve myself by commenting on threads, blogging, twitting, and texting with others. Maybe the best form of involvement for me, as a member of a mass crowd, is to speculate, raise suspicion, form unsubstantiated opinions and present them as fact, get others riled up, scare people, so I don't feel alone and become the 1 in 10 pseudo-expert who doesn't agree -- after all, building a platform on sensational conjecture, in opposition to mainstream sensationalism, is truely the American way (as evidence from this sensational conjecture). (I really hope someone detects my sarcasm)

I find it funny that their article quotes a number of community college professors. So, their big concern is that the pregnant Denny's waitress and the 18 year old who graduated bottom 10% of his high school class are going to cheat at college algebra 101 in the pursuit of their respective associate degree in something trivial? A degree that probably won't even help them land anything above an entry level position anyways? Either way, I'll stick to cheating with my abacus.

Its no revelation that if the consumer is no longer spending for one thing, then it will surely be another. Furthermore, if the consumer finds a better product/service to spend their money on, there will be less demand for the inferior product/service. Is music as a product inferior to other creative expressions? Of course not... but as others suggest, its not about the actual product, but rather the distribution and being able to capitalize on it. When CD players took control of the market share over tapes, consumers stopped buying tapes... How can anyone be surprised that CD sales would be on the decline with the rise of digital format media and players. I'm sure most of you remember the first wave of CD burners to hit the market, media and industry people freaked out about it, ignoring the fact that people made mix tapes all the time. Why is it a surprise to anyone that consumers want to share music? So if I take a photo from a website and share it with my friends, print it out, hang it on my fridge and give a copy to my girlfriend, does the photographer or the person who owns the rights to that photograph also have the right to sue me? Of course not. Now if I redistribute that photograph commercially or use it in a commercial product or claim it as my own, then I'd be in some trouble. The real point of this whole issue is that these money hungry individuals are watching their distribution channel and their rights to profit on the product wane into oblivion and they fear losing control over the consumer's heart, mind and wallet. So they naturally chose to fight it, figuratively kicking and screaming, blaming anything and anyone, but their own failing and antiquated business model.

First, Forgive me if I didn't look closely enough, but I'm not seeing how these statistics are substantiated. On your first link it says one thing and on the other its completely different and what makes this source so valid over something like http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp Now to the point: So what if ie6 is a dev pain, that isn't news. Yes, you build for current standards, but you should also build so your site will gracefully degrade, not just regarding client-side script (JS), but with your markup and styles as well. Just because a visitor can't receive your site exactly the way you want them to, doesn't mean you should instruct them to upgrade just for your site. I'm sorry but if a front-end developer's biggest complaint is accounting for ie6, they should just deal with it and stop whining about ie6 usage and new standards that conflict with the browser. ...Or you can ignore ie6 and its users and justify your elimination of a user market share however you see fit. Please just stay off your soapbox because trying to get others to hop on your bandwagon using a broken record is just annoying