Organize One-Off Task Files with Dated Work Directories
Say you’re about to begin a task that will involve working with some files. Perhaps you’re creating a diagram or encoding some GIFs. Where do you put the files?
Author: John Ruble
Replacing Heroku Review Apps on Non-GitHub Projects
If your software team develops multiple new features simultaneously, you need to be able to deploy and test them in isolation. The gold standard for this is to use Heroku’s review apps, which are temporary environments automatically spun up for each pull request. Unfortunately, the feature only works with GitHub; if you’re using another source […]
Collection Operations on Lazy Sequences in TypeScript with itiriri
I’m currently working in TypeScript after spending a lot of time in F#, and I’ve been experimenting with adapting my favored functional approaches to the former.
Getting Started with AWS Lambda in F#
I recently set out to create my first AWS Lambda function. Of the supported languages, I chose my favorite: F#. In this post, I’ll walk through the process of building a Lambda function in F# and deploying it to AWS. AWS Alphabet Soup Many of Amazon’s web services have famously inscrutable names. After fumbling my […]
Fixing the External Monitor Color Problem with My 2018 MacBook Pro
I recently upgraded to a 2018 MacBook Pro. I’m enjoying the additional cores and memory (😀) and coming to terms with the touchbar (🤨). A low point of my first week came when I plugged into my external display, and the image looked really bad. In this post, I’ll describe what I learned and how […]
Creating Azure WebJobs in F#
My colleague Brian recently wrote about Azure Functions in F#. Azure Functions are great, and I definitely recommend them if they fit your use case. These functions are built on top of an older background processing system called WebJobs. While Functions have largely eclipsed WebJobs, there remain certain [situations][webjobs-vs-functions] where the latter is still a […]
Folding Away Mutations in F#
I’ve been working in F# lately, and one of its smaller features has had a big impact on my programming style: Variables are immutable by default. If you want to change something, you have to declare it mutable. Sometimes, this is what I naturally reach for, and the language rubs my nose in it. Here’s […]
Headless Chrome with Testem on VSTS-Hosted Agents
I previously wrote about building a Node app on VSTS Windows agents. Since then, we’ve started using headless Chrome on those agents. Here’s how.
Review: Kinesis Freestyle Edge Keyboard
I’ve been a happy user of wasd mechanical keyboards at home and work for years, but lately I’ve grown interested in improved ergonomics. Some of my colleagues use various generations of Microsoft ergo boards, but I wanted the flexibility of a split board and didn’t want to give up mechanical switches. When I learned of […]
Tips for Building Your Node App on VSTS Windows Agents
Say you’re building a modern web front end with tools in the JavaScript ecosystem, but you work for a Microsoft shop, so you’re looking down the barrel of running CI in Windows on [Visual Studio Team Services][VSTS]. I’ve been in this situation for a while now, and I have a few tips.