I spent 25 years as a federal contractor, much of it delivering software acquired through the Department of Defense acquisition process. At no point did I feel that the way the government acquired software was particularly well aligned with how we actually built it. Over time, I began to suspect that our customers felt the … Continue reading AI and the Economics of Government Software Procurement
Category: programming
Rings In a Tree
As I was building a Python notebook in Databricks, I started thinking about how much Python work I've been doing since I went out on my own. That got me thinking about all of the SQL I had been doing the last couple of years at my previous role, then the Javascript before that and … Continue reading Rings In a Tree
Lessons from Maps and Old Code
Taking over someone else's code is hard. There is probably no better look at how a person thinks than looking at their code. It can be tempting to trash their code and start from scratch. This temptation often runs into conflict with a sunk-cost fallacy that says "The previous person spent so much time on … Continue reading Lessons from Maps and Old Code




