Author Archives: David Megginson

Burden of Proof

Posted on May 16, 2005 by David Megginson

Bill de hÓra has a thoughtful piece about complexity experts and simplicity mavens. As Bill points out, conventional wisdom provides an easy way to criticize things without really thinking: in the 1990’s, you could diss any project or spec simply … Continue reading →

Tagged programming | 2 Comments

Admin: WP 1.5.1 and Spam Karma

Posted on May 14, 2005 by David Megginson

I’ve just upgraded Quoderat to WordPress 1.5.1 and have installed the Spam Karma plugin, as recommended by Lauren Wood in a comment to my previous whining posting about comment spam. With luck, legitimate comments should now all appear immediately, while … Continue reading →

Tagged blogging | 3 Comments

Problem-first design

Posted on May 3, 2005 by David Megginson

[Update: a nice analogy from Jon Udell, and a thoughtful response from Tim Bray.] WSDL is too abstract to be useful, according to both Tim Bray and Norm Walsh (and for what it’s worth, I agree with them). Tim and … Continue reading →

Posted in General | 5 Comments

More on RSS as the HTML for data …

Posted on April 27, 2005 by David Megginson

A short while ago, I reluctantly acknowledged that RSS 2.0 will likely fill the same role for data that HTML fills for documents, providing a single, shared format across the web (the big missing piece of the puzzle for REST … Continue reading →

Tagged web | 7 Comments

Collateral Damage

Posted on April 14, 2005 by David Megginson

I am a bystander in the war between spammers and virus writers on the one side, and Microsoft and the antivirus companies on the other. I have never in my life read or sent an e-mail message using Microsoft Outlook, … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged programming | 4 Comments

Gmail without AJAX, part 1

Posted on April 11, 2005 by David Megginson

I noticed today that Gmail is now offering an alternative, non-AJAX interface, selectable by choosing “basic HTML” below the message listing. This is actually a great opportunity to experiment and see whether AJAX (or any other kind of heavy DHTML-style … Continue reading →

Tagged web | 4 Comments

Self-classification on the web

Posted on April 11, 2005 by David Megginson

Coordinator: Crucifixion? Prisoner: Er, no, freedom actually. Coordinator: What? Prisoner: Yeah, they said I hadn’t done anything and I could go and live on an island somewhere. Coordinator: Oh I say, that’s very nice. Well, off you go then. Prisoner: … Continue reading →

Tagged web | 5 Comments

Post in REST: create, update, or action?

Posted on April 3, 2005 by David Megginson

(Personally, I think it would be healthier if we worked out the wrinkles in REST by writing lots of code rather than writing lots of blog entries, but blog entries are easier, and XML people have never been shy about … Continue reading →

Posted in General | 10 Comments

REST: is RSS the HTML for data?

Posted on March 31, 2005 by David Megginson

As I’ve mentioned before, REST offloads complexity from the protocol (HTTP) to the content (XML). That makes REST look simple as long as you focus only on the protocol, but RESTafarians cannot get away forever with leaving the content format … Continue reading →

Tagged web | 6 Comments

Admin: Comment and Pingback Limits