03 January 2009

I am not a link blogger, but I can’t help but post this link that shows so clearly why the Single Responsibility Principle is important.

I got this link from another blog I just discovered, The Morning Brew. I’m not sure why I only found out about the Brew now, because it appears to be the perfect resource, for me at least.

I mostly quit reading blogs about 6 months ago – I discovered that reading blogs had largely supplanted doing real work, and that could only lead to really bad results!!

Interestingly, I also mostly quit listening to any new music about 6 months ago. Browsing through the Zune.net catalog for interesting music had largely supplanted being entertained by music (there’s a lot of crap music out there, and I got tired of listening to it).

Is there a parallel here? I think so.

In October (or so), Zune.net introduced a Pandora-like feature where the Zune service creates a “virtual radio station” based on the music you listen to most. This is exactly what I want! I want a DJ (virtual or otherwise) who filters out the crap and provides me with good (and often new) music. The whole Channels idea in Zune.net kept me from canceling my subscription, and the more recent addition of 10 track purchases per month for free clinched the deal.

And I want the same thing for blogs. I don’t want to filter through tons of blog posts about good restaurants, pictures of kids or whatever else. (I’m sure those are interesting to some people, but I read blogs for technical content, and only read friends blogs for non-technical content). And this is where The Morning Brew comes in. It is like a “DJ” for .NET blogs. Perfect!!

I should point out that on twitter I also subscribe to Silverlight News – for the same reason – it is a pre-filtered set of quality links, though I think I may start following this via RSS instead of twitter, because I prefer the RSS reading ability in Outlook to twitter for this particular type of information.

In any case, I hope everyone reading this post has had a wonderful last couple weeks.

For the many of you who had a religious holiday in here, I hope it was fulfilling and you felt the full meaning of the holiday, and that it brought you closer to your god/goddess/gods/ultimate truth. If you had a secular holiday in here, I hope it was fulfilling and meaningful, preferably filled with family and fun and a warm sense of community.

Happy New Year, and welcome to 2009!