Joel on Software

2001/12/13

Michael asks: "I'm interested in anyone's ideas on either good or bad interface issues that they've seen while buying things. Remember that I'm selling software, so order tracking and fulfillment don't really exist..."

I have really smart readers. Wow.

Google now has 20 years of Usenet online. You can entertain yourself with some scary stuff from my past.

• my first post -- this was rather a difficult trick because Penn didn't officially allow undergrads to post to Usenet in those days (so I transferred out!) (April 1988)
• my first Internet lecture -- more than a decade before Joel on Software I had things to say. Not very interesting things though. (August 1988)
• my first contribution to Open Source (September 1988)
• my first software released under GPL (November 1988) -- now the Slashdot kiddies have to shut up; I was writing GPLed software before they were born, bwa ha ha!
• I was writing Macintosh code way back then, too. (August 1993)
• First post from New York (September 1994)

Have you been wondering about Distributed Version Control? It has been a huge productivity boon for us, so I wrote Hg Init, a Mercurial tutorial—check it out!

Want to know more?

You’re reading Joel on Software, stuffed with years and years of completely raving mad articles about software development, managing software teams, designing user interfaces, running successful software companies, and rubber duckies.

About the author.

I’m Joel Spolsky, co-founder of Fog Creek Software, a New York company that proves that you can treat programmers well and still be highly profitable. Programmers get private offices, free lunch, and work 40 hours a week. Customers only pay for software if they’re delighted. We make Trello, insanely simple project management, FogBugz, an enlightened bug tracker designed to help great teams develop brilliant software, and Kiln, which simplifies source control. I’m also the co-founder and CEO of Stack Exchange. More about me.