Jason M. Hanley :: Custom Software Developer

You can now find me at –> http://blog.jasonhanley.com <–

Did you know that nearly 100% of drivers involved in accidents don’t think it was their fault?

This is perhaps not shocking, but what might surprise you more is that nearly 100% of them are wrong!

Most accidents are completely preventable, if you just follow advice from a good driver training program.

The “T-bone”

Primary Fault: “T-bone-ee” mis-judges distance of (or doesn’t even notice) oncoming car and turns left in front of them

Common Excuses:
“They came out of nowhere!” Cars do not randomly appear from spatial vortexes.  It was barreling towards you the entire time.
“They were speeding!” If you could tell they were speeding, you sure as hell should not have turned in front of them.

Primary Prevention: Don’t turn in front of cars unless you damn well know you’re going to make it! (duh)

Secondary Fault: “T-bone-er” ran head on into a car that turned right in front of them!  Never a good idea.

Secondary Prevention: Keep your foot over the brake and plan an avoidance when approaching an intersection with cars waiting to turn left.

The “Rear-end”

Primary Fault: “Rear-end-er” hits the car in front of them because they didn’t stop in time

Common Excuses:
“It was snowing/raining/slippery!” Yeah, so drive according to the road and weather conditions and leave some extra space.
“They stopped too quickly!” Umm, NO — YOU stopped too SLOWLY.

Primary Prevention: Always leave enough room ahead of you for an emergency stop, given current road and weather conditions.

Secondary Fault: The “Rear-end-ee” probably DID stop fast — likely because they weren’t paying enough attention.

Secondary Prevention: Avoid distractions (phone/texting/emailing) while driving and always look far ahead so you can anticipate problems before they “come out of nowhere.”

Those are just two examples.  There are many more.

So everyone — please, pay attention and take responsibility when you’re driving, because if you are involved in an accident — it’s probably, at least partially, YOUR FAULT!

Here’s an idea for word processors and spell checkers. They already underline words in red that they don’t find in their dictionary.

How about if obscure words were underlined in yellow? For instance, I have a habit of typing “manger” instead of “manager” when I’m typing too fast. The word “manger” is probably not used much except around Christmas. It’d be nice if it were flagged in yellow and I could right-click to get a list of more common words with a similar spelling.

Have any spell checkers already implemented something like this? Let me know if you’ve seen it anywhere.

Since I work from home, I’d say my car is generally parked at my apartment building an average of about 23 hours / day (95.8% of the time). Normally my car would have been nestled right back in the corner of the right-hand spot in the picture below.

It just so happened that yesterday when the lightning storm hit, I was out at a networking event that ran late. Looks like that event saved me from a significant insurance claim!

Estimating software development time is hard. There are so many variables, unknowns, “unknown unknowns”, and the specification always changes. Besides that, developers tend to be optimistic by nature.

Here’s a handy little way to come up with a quick, yet accurate estimate:

1. Come up with your best, overall estimate that you feel is realistic using your favorite technique, or pure “gut feeling” if you are a very experienced developer and you know the problem domain well.
2. Ok, you have your absolutely realistic number now, right?
3. It’s not realistic. I guarantee you there are aspects you haven’t thought of. Double the number. This is your best case scenario estimate. This is how long it will take assuming everything goes well and there are no snags or major changes along the way.
4. Now double it again. This is your most likely estimate. This is how long the project will probably take, when all is said and done.
5. Now double it a final time. This is your worst case scenario. If things go really badly, or you run into several major issues, it could take as long as this.

So to sum up:

• E = Your best original time estimate
• 2(E) = Best case scenario time in reality
• 4(E) = Most likely time in reality
• 8(E) = Worst case scenario time in reality