New Stuff, But Still Fun?

Gordon Weakliem's not having fun anymore...

I think I've had it beaten out of me, I've spent too many nights and weekends chasing down stupid quirks, stuff that's not even programming, just accounting and janitorial stuff. I still read programming books in my free time, but most books just depress me. That thought occurred to me while reading one of the Agile process books, so I quit reading about process and started trying to find things that would take me back 12 years, back to when Pascal was neat, and everything seemed easy.

Every time I put fun and programming in the same thought, I go to Ward Cunningham, who still seems to find ways to have fun.

Lately I have been enjoying PragDave's Katas. These get back to the heart of programming and don't require VisualJ2ESharpPlus. Just me, Emacs, and Python.

I am surprised and not surprised at the lack of an outcry for simpler ways to program. My fear is all the good ideas and fun will be left behind.

But XML-RPC is fun. And Chandler looks like it could be the source of fun. Eclipse only looks like fun seen through a Jython lens. (Jython is the best way to get an interactive experience with Java classes!)

dotnet will have the Jython kind of fun eventually.