Too many chefs

Why I love blogs:

Joel on Software writes about a stupid feature in Windows Vista. One of the guys who worked on that stupid feature explains how bloated and process-bound Microsoft has become.

My favorite quote:

My team had a very talented UI (user interface) designer and my particular feature had a good, headstrong program manager with strong ideas about user experience. We had a Mac that we looked to as a paragon of clean UI.

This last line is really important. The lesson is, if you want to do it right, see how it's done on a Mac.

In an sort of related post there's this comment about Zune development.

A striking thing about that little section of Microsoft (the Zune team): pictures of Steve Jobs on doors, walls, bulletin boards, each with a quote from Steve below it. The pictures were there, I was told, to motivate them, and to remind them of their goal. The usual thing for Microsoft, a taillight chase.

The Roches

Check out The Roches. They'll be in Santa Cruz (where Lilah will see them) on Dec. 9 and at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley on Monday and Tuesday the following week.

If you've not heard them and you like folky three-part harmony, you can't go wrong with their first album. Alternatively, and given the season, more appropriately, their Christmas album is good as well.

If you don't have iTunes loaded, here are Amazon links:
The Roches
We Three Kings

Blogger Test

The blog software I use has been updated. This is a test ping to see if it still works. :-)

Kaos, er, Chaos

My friend Greg, expecting better than this, encourages me to speak up. I tell him that not much is going on, I don't have much to write about. He proposes this: CONTROLLED CHAOS. It's an interesting article about experiments in Europe to do away with traffic controls of any kind in an effort to calm traffic and make people responsible, etc.

But Chaos brings to mind Kaos, so add some Kaos to your life.

The theme to Get Smart is the ring-tone I have associated with Molly. The first time it went off in a meeting (my bad) my boss, at the time, took his shoe off and put it to his ear. A fond memory.