/tags/programming/ Recent content in Programming on A Nickel's Worth Hugo -- gohugo.io en Fri, 20 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/avoiding-fallback-in-distributed-systems/ Fri, 20 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/avoiding-fallback-in-distributed-systems/ As previously mentioned, I was recently able to contribute to the Amazon Builders’ Library. I’d also like to share another post that I wrote for the series, entitled Avoiding fallback in distributed systems. I’m especially excited to be able to publish it, as it’s based on an internal Amazon document I wrote in 2006 entitled Modes Considered Harmful. It provoked a lot of interesting discussions over the years, so I’m happy to be able to share a (hopefully slightly better written) version of it publicly. /posts/challenges-with-distributed-systems/ Fri, 20 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/challenges-with-distributed-systems/ I was recently invited to contribute to the Amazon Builders’ Library. One article I’d been wanting to publish publicly is about how bizarre distributed systems are, and what’s been the biggest challenge building them, in my experience. Please check out the article and here’s a quick abstract: Developing distributed utility computing services, such as reliable long-distance telephone networks, or Amazon Web Services (AWS) services, is hard. Distributed computing is also weirder and less intuitive than other forms of computing because of two interrelated problems. /posts/six-audacious-goals-for-your-system/ Tue, 28 Apr 2009 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/six-audacious-goals-for-your-system/ With apologies to the authors of the futurist programming notes, here is a set of audacious goals for your system (by which I mean your collection of web sites, webservices, databases, and so on): Make your entire system runnable (for debugging/development) on a single machine, via a single command, …without manual configuration, …without an Internet connection. Demonstrate that your system works flawlessly even when you permanently and unexpectedly unplug the power cable from any one machine (even your most precious database). /posts/ulrich-dreppers-memory-paper-and-cl/ Thu, 22 May 2008 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/ulrich-dreppers-memory-paper-and-cl/ I recently came across Ulrich Drepper’s excellent paper, What Every Programmer Should Know About Memory. There is a lot of fascinating stuff in there about an important class of things you sometimes need to do to achieve excellent performance. While the paper concentrates on C, I was wondering if some of the same effects could be observed in a high-level language like CL (for the record, I think CL is both high- and low-level, but whatever…) I did a quick experiment which suggests that at least one of Ulrich’s optimizations works in CL. /posts/the-icarus-ultimatum/ Sun, 02 Sep 2007 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/the-icarus-ultimatum/ It is unlikely that every programmer is familiar with Icarus, but I bet that almost all programmers have something in common with him. Programmers are saturated with advice not to do things, similar to the advice Icarus’ dad gave him about aviation. Don’t use threads unless you really know what you’re doing (and then don’t use them anyway.) Don’t use new language features (they’re too dangerous.) Use the “right tool for the right job” (i. /posts/proactive-optimization/ Sat, 25 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/proactive-optimization/ In the programming world, one of the most widely repeated maxims is, “Premature optimization is the root of all evil.” Having found this to be one of the most well-intended yet misunderstood pieces of advice in the history of the Universe, I was all set to write a blog about why. Unfortunately, for me, a quick trip to Wikipedia led me to this article: The Fallacy of Premature Optimization, by Randall Hyde, which said everything I intended to say, and more, and did so more eloquently that I could ever hoped to have (although I might have put in some better jokes).