IMPORTANT POINT: Does anything that matters have a fixed definition?

So how do we classify species? One rule is that two different organisms are of the same species if they can interbreed. But the lines are not always so clear. Elliotte Rusty Harold called out ruby arrays for doing too much. Is it a list, a stack, a map, what? It’s 3 data structures in one? But perhaps part of the problem is that he’s trying to classify something that does not need to be classified. Do we cling to definitions or let them go?

IMPORTANT POINT: People are more important than contracts.

  • In some place in Florida, authorities were concerned about thong bathing suits and covering of the buttocks. One thing led to another, and a 300-word definition of buttocks ended up on the books. Hilarity.
  • In many native american communities, people are dealt justice based on what the players in a given offense agree to - sometimes known as restorative justice.
  • How does ruby survive without namespacing in their libraries? Well, when I created a library that had the same name as an existing library (whoops), I just renamed my library. I realized that repairing the social fabric was more important than having the exact name I wanted.

IMPORTANT POINT: Life is risk, so seek it out.

You may want to be in a company that makes decisions quickly. What may happen instead is a scenario like the following: “You’re right, but this decision was made months ago and it cannot be changed now.” Some companies don’t actually need its developers to be as good as the guys from the next google. Obviously they wouldn’t mind if they got an all-star developer, but it is more important to minimize the risk of having a completely terrible developer. This also may or may not be the type of place you want to work.

IMPORTANT POINT: Things fall apart.

  • Your code won’t last forever
  • Your career won’t last forever
  • Hold on to things as long as they are useful, and then let them go

Meta note: hottest presentation ever.