IEEE Computer Society

IEEE Computer Society

IEEE / Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Incorporated

Online Resource

"What did you do in the war, mommy?"

VHP commemorated WAVES' wartime contributions with a "Code Girl’s Reunion." This past weekend, NBCs “Sunday Today with Willie Geist” aired a story about this historic event, and interviewed a few of these living legends. If you missed it, you can watch it, here.

The mission of the Veterans History Project of the Library of Congress American Folklife Center is to collect, preserve and make accessible the personal accounts of U.S. veterans so that future generations may hear directly from veterans and better understand the realities of war. Learn more at http://www.loc.gov/vets. Share your exciting VHP initiatives, programs, events and news stories with VHP to be considered for a future RSS. Email vohp@loc.gov and place “My VHP RSS Story” in the subject line.

Visit VHP on Facebook.

Click here for more information.

Online Resource

This new program for children in grades 6-8 focuses on hands-on learning activities.

Rotch Library - BP130.45.K37 2018

Bicudo, Edison, author

This week, we chat about why people are nice to each other—does it feel good or are we just avoiding feeling bad—approaches to keeping arsenic out of the food supply, and using artificial intelligence to figure out what a chemical smells like to a human nose with Online News Editor David Grimm. And Stephen Brusatte joins Alexa Billow to discuss why dinosaurs evolved wings and feathers before they ever flew. And in the latest installment of our monthly books segment, Jen Golbeck talks with Bill Schutt, author of Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History.   Listen to previous podcasts. [Image: Todd Marshall; Music: Jeffrey Cook]

Sarah Crespi talks to Sam Smits about how our microbial passengers differ from one culture to the next—are we losing diversity and the ability to fight chronic disease? For our books segment, Jen Golbeck talks with Vyvyan Evans about his book The Emoji Code: The Linguistics Behind Smiley Faces and Scaredy Cats. Listen to previous podcasts. [Image: Woodlouse/Flickr; Music: Jeffrey Cook]

Benjamin, Ruha, author

Du Sautoy, Marcus, author

Online Resource

A dress code insists teaching assistants to wear sarees instead of salwar-kameez.

Berlin ; New York : Springer, [2006]

The panelists talk about code organization and reuse.

Check out JS Remote Conf!

02:22 - Elijah Manor Introduction

• Twitter
• GitHub
• Blog
• LeanKit
• Eliminate JavaScript Code Smells (Elijah's Talk Abstract)
• A video containing the 30 min version of the talk: Eliminate JavaScript Code Smells
• The full slides (60 mins worth of material)

04:49 - What is a “Code Smell”?

• Martin Fowler: CodeSmell
• ESLint
• JSHint

10:21 - Copy/Paste Code Error

• jsinspect and jscpd
• ES6, ES7, Babel Support

13:11 - Using ES6 to Eliminate Code Smells

15:48 - Refactoring Case Statements

• The Strategy Pattern

21:29 - Juniors and Code Smells

• Code Reviews

27:29 - Isomorphic Code

31:12 - Framework Code Smells

33:47 - Identifying New Code Smells

36:33 - When Code Smells are OK

39:10 - Why use parameters?

Picks

Terms And Conditions May Apply (AJ)
Nodevember (Aimee)
Developer Tea (Aimee)
Jake Shimabukuro (Joe)
Screeps (Joe)
react-styleguide-generator (Elijah)
react-styleguidist (Elijah)
The Phantom Menace - What it Should Have Been (AJ)
Attack of the Clones - What it Should Have Been (AJ)

Check out allremoteconfs.com to get in on all the conference action this year -- from the comfort of your own home!

02:13 - Chris Dias Introduction

• Twitter
• GitHub

02:21 - Erich Gamma Introduction

• Twitter
• GitHub

02:31 - Visual Studio Code

• @code

03:49 - Built on Electron

• JavaScript Jabber Episode #193: Electron with Jessica Lord and Amy Palamountain

04:25 - Why another tool?

• Visual Debugging
• Keybinding Support

08:12 - Code Folding

09:00 - Will people move from Visual Studio to Visual Studio Code?

12:06 - Language Support

• C#

18:06 - Visual Studio Code and Microsoft Goals

22:47 - Community Support and Building Extensions

28:31 - The Choice to Use Electron

32:41 - Getting VS Code to Work on the Command Line

35:02 - Tabs

38:49 - Visual Studio Code Uptake and Adoption

40:11 - Licenses

44:46 - Designing a UX for Developers

58:15 - Design Patterns

Picks

LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens Video Game - Announce Teaser Trailer (Joe)
Firebase (Joe)
Progress bar noticeably slows down npm install: Issue #11283 (Jamison)
Darkest Dungeon (Jamison)
Trek Glowacki Twitter Thread (Jamison)
Mogo Portable Seat (Chuck)
Clear Acrylic Wall Mountable 10 Slot Dry Erase Marker & Eraser Holder Organizer Rack (Chuck)
Bitmap Graphics SIGGRAPH'84 Course Notes (Erich)
Salsa (Chris)
The Microsoft Band (Chris)
Making a Murderer (Chris)

03:10 - Quincy Larson Introduction

• Twitter
• GitHub

03:20 - Free Code Camp

• @FreeCodeCamp  

04:47 - Quincy’s Background

06:43 - Curriculum and Non-Profit Projects

09:47 - Keeping the Curriculum Updated

10:30 - Enrollment; Starting & Finishing

12:20 - Resources for Learning

• Gitter

15:39 - Funding

16:06 - Working Through a Self-Paced System vs Structure

17:17 - Nonprofits

19:51 - Learning to Work on Non-Greenfield Code

21:47 - Getting Hired After the Program

23:21 - Marketing and Media

• Medium: Free Code Camp
• Camper News
• Twitch.tv: freecodecamp

26:07 - Sustaining Living While Running This Program

27:31 - The Future of Free Code Camp

• Free Code Camp Wiki

28:34 - Long-term Sustainability

29:44 - Hypothetical Monetization and Contribution

33:51 - Coding as a form of art or function?

36:55 - Partnerships

• Project Management Institute

37:53 - Making Free Code Camp More Effective

39:18 - Criticism?

40:29 - Curriculum Development and Evolution

43:02 - Is Free Code Camp for everybody?

• Read, Search, Ask

46:09 - The Community

51:07 - Getting Involved in Free Code Camp

• Free Code Camp Volunteer Quiz

Picks

Our Greatest Fear — Marianne Williamson (AJ)
The Rabbit Joint - The Legend of Zelda (AJ)
Nintendo (Twilight Princess HD Soundtrack) (AJ)
Steve Wozniak: The early days @ TEDxBerkeley (AJ)
Favor of the Pharaoh (Joe)
The Goldbergs (Joe)
The Best Podcast Rap (Chuck)
Word Swag (Chuck)
Cecily Carver: Things I Wish Someone Had Told Me When I Was Learning How to Code (Quincy)
Code for the Kingdom (Aimee)
diff-so-fancy (Aimee)

This episode was recorded live from The Microsoft Build Conference 2016. In this episode we chatted with Gaurav Seth of Microsoft about ChakraCore. You can follow him on Twitter, or check out what he’s done over on GitHub.

Picks

• TypeScript (Gaurav)
• Richard Campbell and Carl Franklin from .NETRocks

This episode was recorded live from The Microsoft Build Conference 2016. In this episode we chatted with Wade Anderson of Microsoft about Visual Studio Code. You can follow him on Twitter, or check out what he’s done over on GitHub.

Picks

• Parks and Recreation (Wade)
• VidAngel (Wade)

A special thanks again goes out to Richard Campbell and Carl Franklin from .NETRocks for putting this podcast series together! You rock!

3:23 Discussing the purpose and aim of Codewars

7:30 The process for building a program with Codewars

11:07 The UI and editor experience

12:55 The challenges faced when first building Codewars

14:23 Explaining PJAX

16:54 Building code on Codewars

21:24 The expanded use of KATA on Codewars

23:11 Practicing “solving problems” and how it translates to real world situations

34:00 How Codewars proves out the persistence of coders

36:41 How Codewars appeals to collaborative workers

44:40 Teachable moments on Codewars

49:40 Always check to see if Codewars is hiring. Codewars uses Qualified.io, which helps automate the hiring process.

PICKS:

Marrow Sci-fi book

Uprooted Fantasy book

“Write Less Code” blog post

“The Rands Test” blog post

Five Stack software development studio

“Stranger Things” on Netflix

Angular 2 Class in Ft. Lauderdale, Discount Code: JSJ

Lean Analytics book

Code book

Datasmart book

Letting Go book

00:55 - Introducing Jerome Hardaway

• Vets Who Code
• Ruby Rogues Podcast
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

02:10 - Spouses and dependants of Vets Who Code

06:55 - Accepting and rejecting applicants

10:10 - The GI Bill

• Operation Code
• Dreamforce

15:45 - Military language and coding

18:20 - PTSD, trauma, and coding

21:10 - Moving past the veteran stigma

25:45 - Military backgrounds as an asset for jobs

30:45 - The future of Vets Who Code

32:35 - How much does it cost to be part of the program?

• General Assembly

36:15 - Is it easier or harder for Vets to get hired?

39:15 - Stories and memories

42:30 - Contributing to Vets Who Code

• Contact hello@vetswhocode.io to become a mentor
• Donate: https://vetswhocode.kindful.com/
• SwearJar
• Hiring managers please contact Jerome@vetswhocode.io

Picks:

Soft Skills Engineering Podcast (Dave)

Soft Skills Engineering Twitter (Dave)

Awesome Algorithms Github list (Aimee)

“The Churn” blog post by Bob Martin (Aimee)

The 12 Week Year by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington (Charles)

Vets Who Code (Jerome)

Practical Javascript (Jerome)

Previous Episodes with Visual Studio Code’s Team:

JSJ Episode 199, Visual Studio Code with Chris Dias and Erich Gamma

JSJ Episode 221, Visual Studio Code with Wade Anderson

1:45 - What’s new at Visual Studio Code

• Visual Studio Code’s Twitter
• VS Code Github
• Chris Dias’ Twitter
• Chris Dias’ Github

3:42 - Confusion with Javascript versus separate languages

7:15 - Choosing your tools carefully

8:20 - Integrated shell and docker extensions

12:05 - Agar.io Extensions and extension packs

16:15- Deciding what goes into Visual Studio Code and what becomes an extension

18:20 - Using Github Issues and resolving user complaints

22:08 - Why do people stray away from VS proper?

23:10 - Microsoft and VS legacy

27:00 - Man hours and project development

31:30 - The Visual Studio default experience

37:10 - What are people writing with VS Code?

39:20 - Community versus developer views of VS Code

41:40 - Using Electron

44:00 - Updating the system

44:50 - How is Visual Code written?

48:00 - The future of Visual Code Studios

• https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues

Picks:

Don McMillan (AJ)

Daplie Wefunder (AJ)

Daplie (AJ)

Facebook feed blocker plug-in (Charles)

Tab Wrangler (Charles)

Smart Things (Chris)

Wood Pizza Ovens (Chis)

PJ Mark, Chris’ friend and marketer (Chris)

On today's JavaScript Jabber Show, Charles, Joe, Aimee, Cory, and AJ discuss Clean Code JavaScript with Ryan McDermott. Ryan is a UX Engineer at Google and has been a professional developer for 5 years. He's focused on frontend Angular and backend node.js. Stay tuned to learn more about his current project with JavaScript!

JSJ 265 Wade Anderson and Ramya Rao on Visual Studio Code

This episode is live at the Microsoft Build 2017 with Charles Max Wood and AJ O’Neal. We have Wade Anderson and Ramya Rao from the Visual Studio Code Team at Microsoft. Tune in and learn more about what’s new with Visual Studio Code!

[00:01:20] – Introduction to Ramya Rao and Wade Anderson

Ramya Rao and Wade Anderson are in the Visual Studio Code Team at Microsoft.

Questions for Wade and Ramya

[00:02:00] – Elevator Pitch for Visual Studio Code

Our vision on Visual Studio Code is to take what was best out of the IDE world (Visual Studio, Eclipse, IntelliJ, etc.) and bring what was best from the lightweight editor world (Sublime Text, Notepad++, Atom) and merge those two together. We wanted the lightweight features from text editors and the debugging capabilities of Visual Studio and Eclipse. We did general availability last year. We’ve been stable for a year. Additionally, this is Visual Studio Code for Mac, Windows, or Linux. It’s also built in Electron.

[00:03:45] – What are your roles on the team? Do you have particular parts that each of you work on?

Wade’s title is a Program Manager. He does more non-developer things but Ramya is an engineer on the team so she gets a lot more coding that Wade does. Everybody has a key area to own but nothing stops them to go into another area. We try to share knowledge between people but we always have that one key owner that you always go to.

Ramya is a recent addition to the team. She started out maintaining the Go extension, maintaining and adding features. She’s slowly branching out to the Emmet features of the product.

[00:05:30] What is Emmet?

Emmet, or Zen Coding, is a must-have tool for you. You can write, say abbreviations and that expands to really huge HTML to update tags, rename tags, etc. That is one of the features of Emmet and Sergey actually wrote the library. We have an in built integration in the product. I [Ramya] am currently working on that.

[00:06:28] Does Visual Studio Code make it easy to go to the parts that I need to customize on an HTML?

In that case, we have a multi-cursor software in Visual Studio Code, as well. You could place your cursor in different positions, and then, simultaneously edit things.

[00:07:42] Is Emmet an extension or does it come with Visual Studio Code?

Right now, it’s in Built. If you want to know more about Emmet features, you can to emmet.io. That has all the documentation that you need to learn about Emmet features. In Visual Studio Code right now, we’re looking at making into an extension. We pull it out of the main code and maybe more people can contribute and make it even more better.

[00:08:21] – What’s new in Visual Studio Code?

One of our main pillars for this year is to improve performance of the product. We’ve grown a larger team so we’re adding a lot more features every month. Last few months has been, “How can we get some stability on the issues coming in while making sure we’re reducing our tech load?” We really keep to those core principles that we started with at the beginning, which was, we want a fast, lightweight editor.

We built a few extensions that we call key map extensions. They are just a mapping of key bindings that you learned in Sublime Text. You don’t have to re-learn any key bindings in Visual Studio Code.

We also build this Welcome page where you can flip through and see features really briefly. In that Welcome page, one of the key things is an interactive playground where you can play with existing code in different sections. Additionally, as we’ve mentioned, we also put multi-cursor features.

Another thing is workbench naming. You can change the theme of Visual Studio Code but it will be restricted to the editor and not the rest of the workbench.

[00:13:40] – Do you know how Xterm.js works as it was one of the features that you’ve added in Visual Studio Code?

Daniel’s another engineer that’s here with us today. He was the largest contributor to the Xterm.js project. He built the integrated terminal for Visual Studio code so I can’t speak to the internals of how that works.

[00:14:12] – Are we going to start seeing Visual Studio Code integrated into web experiences with other Microsoft products?

That’s actually where we started. We were Monaco editor where you get this cloud-based editing experience. We’re getting people to use it but we’re only getting people who were already using Microsoft products.  When electron came out, we saw an opportunity of, “Hey, can we port this  Monaco editor to Electron and we could then, run it on Mac and Linux.”

[00:19:45] – What are the performance things that you’ve done?

One thing that we did recently was adding an ability to calculate the start time for Visual Studio Code? That’s one of our full steps to get more information from the user-side. How can you get a profile of what things are running? Which part of the process took much time?

We also need to identify what are the things people are doing that’s causing the editor slow down. An example is when you open a large file and things get laggy.

Another exercise we did was we looked at all of our extension API’s to see which one of those could be a malicious extension.

The difference between VS Code and Atom is that, we ask questions like, “Are we using good data structures? Are we managing our memory properly? Are we removing stuff we don’t need anymore?” That just comes down to all those little things you learn from basic textbooks that have been around for decades about how to write good code. That’s what we have been doing and that’s what we’ll continue to try to do, to try and improve the performance.

[00:25:55] – Do you have problem on the desktop? Are all the modules just load at once?

We definitely don’t load everything at once. Different parts of the editor is loaded differently. When you do the Require, we don’t do it at first load. We do it when we notice that the user wants to use Emmet. We don’t try to load all the library at the beginning and delay the whole process.

We try to lazy load as much as possible, even the extensions. We have a separate process called extension host that takes care of loading all the extensions. Whether the extensions are completed loading or not, that does not stop you from typing in a file. Simple actions shouldn’t be bugged down by fancy actions.

[00:28:25] – What’s coming next for Visual Studio Code?

Every month, when we plan our iteration, we create iteration draft plan. We put it out there for people to see. Performance and helping people get started are probably the top two for us. You can look at github.com/Microsoft/vscode, look for the label ‘iteration plan draft.’ So that’s the current work that we’re doing that month.

Another feature is the multi-root workspace where you can open multiple folders. When you look at the issues and sort by most comments, multi-root is the number one. The second one that is little paper cuts around formatting and auto-intending – just things that make your code prettier.

Picks

AJ O’neal

• Breath on the Wild
• Microsoft’s Intelligent Edge

Charles Max Wood

• Boom Beach
• Bluetick.io
• Emacs key binding extension for Visual Studio Code

Wade Anderson

• Kindle Paperwhite
•  Twitter @waderyan_

Ramya Rao

• Open source
• Twitter @ramyanexus

JSJ 273: Live to Code, Don't Code to Live with 2 Frugal Dudes Sean Merron and Kevin Griffin

This episode of JavaScript Jabber features panelists Aimee Knight, Cory House, and Charles Max Wood. Special guests Sean Merron and Kevin Griffin discuss how to live frugally. Tune in to hear their advice!

[00:02:14] Introduction to Sean and Kevin

Sean and Kevin are the hosts of the 2 Frugal Dudes Podcast. They are middle class software engineers. Sean works a 9 to 5 job, while Kevin owns a small business called Swift Kick. Swift Kick is a company that focuses on independent consulting, software development, and training companies for software development.

[00:05:50] Different Types of Financial Advisors

There is no legal reason that financial advisors have to work in your best interest. On the 2 Frugal Dudes Podcast, Sean and Kevin advise people to use fiduciary advisors. These types of advisors are not legally allowed to accept kickbacks from different funds. This means that they are more likely to help you to the best of their ability. They get paid for their services. Laws are currently changing so that everyone has to be a fiduciary advisor unless clients sign a specific form.

[00:10:00] What do I do with money left over at the end of the month that I can’t put into a 401K and Roth IRA?

They suggest that you put only the amount of money in your 401K that your company will match. Then, put the rest into a Roth IRA and max that out. Before you decide to do what next, you need to decide why you are saving money. When will you need the money? What will you need it for? Once you know the answer to these questions, you will be able to assess what your money will best be placed. For example, if you are saving to buy a house you need to put your money in a safe investment. A Roth IRA can be used as a savings vehicle or as an emergency fund. Sean believes that a Bank CD is the safest return you can get.

[00:14:30] Best Way to Save 

For those who are self-employed, it is a good idea to have two emergency funds – a personal and a business fund. Business emergency funds should have five months of personal salary. Kevin built his up over two or three years and uses it as self-insurance.

Sean says that the employee world is different. For him, he only keeps the minimum amount in his emergency fund. He knows that he is in a field where his job is in high demand, so feels comfortable with being able to get a job quickly. For others, this may not be the case. Have to evaluate how much to save based on how long you think you may need the money. 

[00:18:50] What is the first thing people should be doing for their own financial well being?

Kevin follows Dave Ramsey’s advice.

1. Basic emergency fund. He uses $1,000. Most emergencies fall under that amount of money.
2. Get rid of all consumer debt. This includes car payments, credit cards, and student loans. Mortgage is not consumer debt.
3. Grow an emergency fund to three or six months of expenses.
4. Investments. Setting up retirement funds, paying for college, or mortgages.

Sean values early retirement so he focuses on that. What does retirement mean to me? What does rich mean? You should always track your money through a budget. Then you can funnel money towards emergency funds and tackling debt.

Self-insurance means that you don’t have to worry about funds. It helps lower your stress knowing that you have your finances in order. It is a peaceful place to be and opens up opportunities for you. If someone has stressors in their life – for example, their car breaks down – and they have no money to fix it, they now have car and money problems. This stress can then potentially lead to other problems such as marriage problems. If the money to fix the broken car would have been there, it would alleviate stress.

[00:28:23] Difference between 401k, IRA, and Roth IRAs

A 401k is an employer provided, long-term retirement savings account. This is where you put in money before it is taxed. With this plan you are limited with the funds you can choose from to invest in.

IRAs are long-term retirement plans as well. The first type of IRA is a Traditional IRA, which is similar to a 401k. You get tax reduction for the money you put in the account. You pay taxes once you withdraw money. A Roth IRA is where you already pay taxes on money that you are putting in, but don’t have to pay taxes when withdrawing money. You can withdraw contributions at anytime without being penalized, you just can’t take out any earnings.

Another thing that is potentially good for early retirement is a Roth IRA conversion ladder. This is where you take money from a 401k and convert it into a Roth IRA and use it before 60 years old to fund early retirement.

Traditional IRAs are good for business owners looking for tax deductions now. An HSA (Health Savings Account) can also be used as a retirement device. It goes towards medical expenses if needed.

[00:34:20] Are there tools or algorithms I can use to figure this stuff out?

There are some. Portfolio Visualizer allows you to choose different portfolio mixes and put different amounts of money in each one. Portfolio Charts is similar to Portfolio Visualizer but gives nice graphics. Sean created a JavaScript website to help people use to figure out early retirement.

The hardest part is calculating return because you have to estimate what your return will be each year.

[00:39:00] Put Your Money Somewhere

The only bad investment is not making an investment. Even making a bad investment is better than not having any at all. Inflation eats away at money that is just sitting.

[00:42:05] If you get one of these advisors what advice should you be looking for?

Need someone that tries to understand your particular situation. “It depends” is very true and your advisor should know that. No two people will have the same financial goals. They should want to help reach your goals in the least costly way possible. Other things they should be able to do is be honest and help you control your emotions during upswings and downswings. 

[00:47:08] Why index funds?

As an investor, you can buy an index fund cheaper than buying the whole index. A mutual fund will try to buy and sell the stocks in that index in order to follow the index's performance. As an investor, you have the opportunity to buy into a mutual fund that handles it for you.

You don’t have to independently invest in companies either. You can invest in an index instead that will look at, for example, top performing technology companies. It is usually a better value.

[00:53:33] How much do I invest in my business verses putting money into a Roth IRA or 401k?

Sean thinks it comes down to retirement goals. At some point you will want money to come in passively and retire in the future. If you can passively put X amount of dollars into your company then it can be looked at as a form of investment.

Kevin evaluates his business goals every quarter. He creates a business budget based off of those goals.

Picks

Cory

• Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton Malkiel 
• Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki 
• Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday

Aimee

• Hacker News Thread – How to Not Bring Emotions Home With You
• Phantogram 

Charles

• Money Master the Game by Tony Robbins 
• ELPs (Endorsed Local Providers) Dave Ramsey

Sean

• The Little Book of Common Sense Investing by John Bogle
• Mr. Money Mustache Blog 
• www.mint.com

Kevin

• Unshakable by Tony Robbins
• YNABS 
• The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas Stanley

Links

• 2 Frugal Dudes Twitter
• Sean's Twitter
• Kevin's Twitter
• www.swiftkick.in
• www.kevgriffin.com
• http://earlyretirementroadmap.com/
• 2 Frugal Dudes Podcast

Panel:

Charles Max Wood

Special Guests: 

Chris Dias

PJ Meyer

In this episode, Charles is at Microsoft Connect 2017 in NYC. Charles speaks with Chris Dias and PJ Meyer about Visual Studio Code and Live Sharing. Chris and PJ explain more on their demo at Microsoft Connect on Live Collaborative Editing and Debugging. Learn more about the new features with Visual Studio Code and the efficient workflows with screen sharing, and much more.

In particular, we dive pretty deep on:

• Demo of Live Collaborative Editing and Debugging explained
• New Features with VS Code
• Developer productive
• Debugging pain points
• Getting feedback
• New in VS Code
• Language support and Java Debugger
• Live Share
• Debugging from different machines and platforms
• Multi-Stage Docker File
• TypeScript compiler
• More on debugging with Cosmos db
• Debugging in the Cloud?
• Docker Extensions
• Data Bricks
• Updated python tools
• Coming up with Visual Studio Code in the next 6 months
• TypeScript and Refactoring
• Getting the word out about code -  Word of mouth?
• Number of people using VS Code?
• Envision for what VS Code is becoming?
• Preparing for a keynote and processes?
• And much more!

Links:

• https://code.visualstudio.com
• https://github.com/chrisdias
• GitHub.com/microsoft
• @code

Picks:

Chris

• Pizza

PJ

• Deli

Charles

• Coupon Pass for tourist in NYC

Panel:

• Charles Max Wood

Special Guests: Matt Hernandez and Amanda Silver

In this episode, the JavaScript Jabber/Adventures In Angular, panelists discuss Visual Studio Code and the VS Code Azure Extension with Matt Hernandez and Amanda Silver at Microsoft Build. Amanda is the director of program management at Microsoft working on Visual Studio and VS Code. Matt works on a mix between the Azure and the VS Code team, where he leads the effort to build the Azure extensions in VS code, trying to bring JavaScript developers to Azure through great experiences in VS Code. They talk about what’s new in VS Code, how the Azure extension works, what log points are, and much more!

In particular, we dive pretty deep on:

• Amanda intro
• Matt intro
• What’s new in VS Code?
• VS Code core
• VS Live Share
• Shared Terminal
• Now have Linux support
• Live Share is now public to the world for free
• What would you use Shared Terminal for?
• Are there other things coming up in VS Code?
• Constantly responding to requests from the community
• Live Share works for any language
• How does the Azure extension work?
• Azure App Service
• Storage extension
• Azure Cosmos DB
• What are log points?
• All a part of a larger plan to create a better experience for JS developers
• Visual debuggers
• Is it the same plugin to support everything on Azure?
• Want to target specific services that node developers will take advantage of
• And much, much more!

Links:

• Visual Studio
• VS Code
• Azure
• Live Share
• Azure Cosmos DB
• Microsoft Build
• Azure App Service
• Amanda’s GitHub
• @amandaksilver
• Matt’s GitHub
• @fiveisprime

Picks:

Charles

• Orphan Black
• Shout out to VS Code team
• Battle of the Books

Matt

• The Customer-Driven Playbook by Travis Lowdermilk
• The Speed of Trust by Stephen M.R. Covey
• Yes, And by Kelly Leonard
• Digital Marketing For Dummies by Ryan Deiss
• Ed Gets His Power Back Kickstarter

Amanda

• Microsoft Quantum Development Kit for Visual Studio Code
• Iggy Peck, Architect
• Tek by Patrick McDonnell

Panel:

• Charles Max Wood

Special Guests: Rachel MacFarlane and Matt Bierner

In this episode, the JavaScript Jabber panelists discuss Visual Studio Code with Rachel MacFarlane and Matt Bierner, who are both developers on Visual Studio Code. They talk about what the workflow at Visual Studio Code looks like, what people can look forward to coming out soon,  and how people can follow along the VS Code improvements on GitHub and Twitter. They also touch on their favorite extensions, like the Docker extension and the Azure extension and their favorite VS Code features.

In particular, we dive pretty deep on:

• Rachel and Matt intro
• Month to month workflow of Visual Studio Code
• VS Code JavaScript, TypeScript, and Mark Down support
• Working on GitHub and within the community
• Check out new features incrementally with insiders
• Community driven work
• What is coming out in Visual Studio Code?
• GitHub helps to determine what they work on
• Working on Grid View
• Improved settings UI
• Highlighting unused variables in your code
• Improvements with JS Docs
• Dart
• Visual Studio Extension API
• How do people follow along with the VS Code improvements?
• Follow along on GitHub and Twitter
• Download VS Code Insiders
• Have a general road map of what the plan is for the year
• Technical debt week
• What do you wish people knew about VS Code?
• Favorite extensions
• Docker extension and Azure extension
• And much, much more!

Links:

• Visual Studio Code
• JavaScript
• TypeScript
• Dart
• VS Code GitHub
• @Code
• VS Code Insiders
• Docker extension
• Azure extension
• Rachel’s GitHub
• Matt’s GitHub
• MattBierner.com
• @mattbierner

Sponsors

• Kendo UI
• Linode
• FreshBooks

Picks:

Charles

• Orphan Black
• Avengers: Infinity War
• Fishing

Rachel

• GitLens

Matt

• The Bronx Warriors

Carl Mungazi is a frontend developer at Limejump in London. He is a former journalist and switched to programming in 2016. Today the panel is discussing the benefits of reading source code. Carl began reading source code because he came into programming late and from a different field. His first project was with Mithril, and he read the source code and documentation to help him understand it. The panelists discuss how reading the source code has helped them and others to improve their coding. They compare reading and understanding source code to learning a foreign language, and discuss  different methods. 

Carl gives some suggestions for reading source code effectively. He advises people to be patient and step through the code. Accept that you will probably take a wrong path at some point or another, but the more you read, the more you will see patterns in how libraries are structured. He also encourages listeners to approach the authors, as they are often happy to lend a hand. Reading source code is an active approach of stepping through, debugging, putting in break points, checking the stack, and so forth. It’s also important to do outside research. 

Since he has been reading source code, Carl has come to prefer plain JavaScript and libraries with as little code as possible. The panel discusses the benefits of small, simple libraries. Carl gives examples of techniques that he learned from reading a library source code and how he applied it to his own coding style. Reading source code has made him more careful about mixing logic and UI, and now he separates them. He also is more confident in seeing a problem, going to a preexisting library, and just importing the fix for that problem rather than the whole library. Reading source code is really about understanding the code you use in your project. It may slow you down, but you’ll be thankful in the long term because it will help you solve future bugs more efficiently. Carl talks more about his debugging process. He still relies on a debugger, but reading a library helps you to see patterns and guess the output of a function. These patterns persist in other libraries as well. Once you can guess correctly what will happen, you go back to reading the code and find instances where the output is unexpected, and fix it. Carl’s closing thoughts are that through reading source code, he has learned that although code is used differently in each library, they are all written in the same language, and therefore interrelated. This gave him more confidence in reading code because they’re all fundamentally the same. When a bug is discovered, he encourages listeners to look at the source code before googling a solution. 

Panelists

• AJ O’Neal

• Dan Shapir

• Steve Edwards

• Charles Max Wood

Guest

• Carl Mungazi

Sponsors

• Hasura.io 

• Sentry | Use the code “devchat” for $100 credit

• Adventures in Angular

Links

• Mithril.js

• Preact

• Limejump

Picks

AJ O’Neal

• Zen of Python

• The Go Proverbs

• Go with Versions

• Link’s Awakening soundtrack

Dan Shapir

• Programming Pearls book

• Lord of Light

Steve Edwards

• Jabra Elite 65T

Charles Max Wood

• Garth Brooks

• The Rocky movies

Carl Mungazi

• Follow Carl @CarlMungazi and carlmungazi.com

• EcmaScript Spec

• HTML 5.2

• Snarky Puppy

"The MaxCoders Guide to Finding Your Dream Developer Job" by Charles Max Wood is available on Amazon. Get your copy here today only for $2.99!

"The MaxCoders Guide to Finding Your Dream Developer Job" by Charles Max Wood is available on Amazon. Get your copy here today only for $2.99!

Grene, Nicholas

Online Resource

Twitter Lite uses Redux for state management and relies on code-splitting. However, Redux’s default API is not designed for applications that are incrementally-loaded during a user session.

This post describes how I added support for incrementally loading the Redux modules in Twitter Lite. It’s relatively straight-forward and proven in production over several years.

Redux modules

Redux modules comprise of a reducer, actions, action creators, and selectors. Organizing redux code into self-contained modules makes it possible to create APIs that don’t involve directly referencing the internal state of a reducer – this makes refactoring and testing a lot easier. (More about the concept of redux modules.)

Here’s an example of a small “redux module”.

// data/notifications/index.js

const initialState = [];
let notificationId = 0;

const createActionName = name => `app/notifications/${name}`;

// reducer
export default function reducer(state = initialState, action = {}) {
  switch (action.type) {
    case ADD_NOTIFICATION:
      return [...state, { ...action.payload, id: notificationId += 1 }];
    case REMOVE_NOTIFICATION:
      return state.slice(1);
    default:
      return state;
  }
}

// selectors
export const selectAllNotifications = state => state.notifications;
export const selectNextNotification = state => state.notifications[0];

// actions
export const ADD_NOTIFICATION = createActionName(ADD_NOTIFICATION);
export const REMOVE_NOTIFICATION = createActionName(REMOVE_NOTIFICATION);

// action creators
export const addNotification = payload => ({ payload, type: ADD_NOTIFICATION });
export const removeNotification = () => ({ type: REMOVE_NOTIFICATION });

This module can be used to add and select notifications. Here’s an example of how it can be used to provide props to a React component.

// components/NotificationView/connect.js

import { connect } from 'react-redux';
import { createStructuredSelector } from 'reselect';
import { removeNotification, selectNextNotification } from '../../data/notifications';

const mapStateToProps = createStructuredSelector({
  nextNotification: selectNextNotification
});
const mapDispatchToProps = { removeNotification };

export default connect(mapStateToProps, mapDispatchToProps);

// components/NotificationView/index.js

import connect from './connect';
export class NotificationView extends React.Component { /*...*/ }
export default connect(NotificationView);

This allows you to import specific modules that are responsible for modifying and querying specific parts of the overall state. This can be very useful when relying on code-splitting.

However, problems with this approach are evident once it comes to adding the reducer to a Redux store.

// data/createStore.js

import { combineReducers, createStore } from 'redux';
Import notifications from './notifications';

const initialState = /* from local storage or server */

const reducer = combineReducers({ notifications });
const store = createStore(reducer, initialState);

export default store;

You’ll notice that the notifications namespace is defined at the time the store is created, and not by the Redux module that defines the reducer. If the “notifications” reducer name is changed in createStore, all the selectors in the “notifications” Redux module no longer work. Worse, every Redux module needs to be imported in the createStore file before it can be added to the store’s reducer. This doesn’t scale and isn’t good for large apps that rely on code-splitting to incrementally load modules. A large app could have dozens of Redux modules, many of which are only used by a few components and unnecessary for initial render.

Both of these issues can be avoided by introducing a Redux reducer registry.

Redux reducer registry

The reducer registry enables Redux reducers to be added to the store’s reducer after the store has been created. This allows Redux modules to be loaded on-demand, without requiring all Redux modules to be bundled in the main chunk for the store to correctly initialize.

// data/reducerRegistry.js

export class ReducerRegistry {
  constructor() {
    this._emitChange = null;
    this._reducers = {};
  }

  getReducers() {
    return { ...this._reducers };
  }

  register(name, reducer) {
    this._reducers = { ...this._reducers, [name]: reducer };
    if (this._emitChange) {
      this._emitChange(this.getReducers());
    }
  }

  setChangeListener(listener) {
    this._emitChange = listener;
  }
}

const reducerRegistry = new ReducerRegistry();
export default reducerRegistry;

Each Redux module can now register itself and define its own reducer name.

// data/notifications/index.js

import reducerRegistry from '../reducerRegistry';

const initialState = [];
let notificationId = 0;

const reducerName = 'notifications';

const createActionName = name => `app/${reducerName}/${name}`;

// reducer
export default function reducer(state = initialState, action = {}) {
  switch (action.type) {
    case ADD_NOTIFICATION:
      return [...state, { ...action.payload, id: notificationId += 1 }];
    case REMOVE_NOTIFICATION:
      return state.slice(1);
    default:
      return state;
  }
}

reducerRegistry.register(reducerName, reducer);

// selectors
export const selectAllNotifications = state => state[reducerName];
export const selectNextNotification = state => state[reducerName][0];

// actions
export const ADD_NOTIFICATION = createActionName(ADD_NOTIFICATION);
export const REMOVE_NOTIFICATION = createActionName(REMOVE_NOTIFICATION);

// action creators
export const addNotification = payload => ({ payload, type: ADD_NOTIFICATION });
export const removeNotification = () => ({ type: REMOVE_NOTIFICATION });

Next, we need to replace the store’s combined reducer whenever a new reducer is registered (e.g., after loading an on-demand chunk). This is complicated slightly by the need to preserve initial state that may have been created by reducers that aren’t yet loaded on the client. By default, once an action is dispatched, Redux will throw away state that is not tied to a known reducer. To avoid that, reducer stubs are created to preserve the state.

// data/createStore.js

import { combineReducers, createStore } from 'redux';
import reducerRegistry from './reducerRegistry';

const initialState = /* from local storage or server */

// Preserve initial state for not-yet-loaded reducers
const combine = (reducers) => {
  const reducerNames = Object.keys(reducers);
  Object.keys(initialState).forEach(item => {
    if (reducerNames.indexOf(item) === -1) {
      reducers[item] = (state = null) => state;
    }
  });
  return combineReducers(reducers);
};

const reducer = combine(reducerRegistry.getReducers());
const store = createStore(reducer, initialState);

// Replace the store's reducer whenever a new reducer is registered.
reducerRegistry.setChangeListener(reducers => {
  store.replaceReducer(combine(reducers));
});

export default store;

Managing the Redux store’s reducer with a registry should help you better code-split your application and modularize your state management.

Brikman, Yevgeniy, author

Interview with Robert W. Yeh, MD, MSc, MBA, author of Temporal Trends in Unstable Angina Diagnosis Codes for Outpatient Percutaneous Coronary Interventions, and David L. Brown, MD, FACC, author of Gaming, Upcoding, Fraud, and the Stubborn Persistence of Unstable Angina

MDX is a killer feature for things like blogs, slide decks and component documentation. It allows you to write Markdown without worrying about HTML elements, their formatting and placement while sprinkling in the magic of custom React components when necessary.

Let’s harness that magic and look at how we can customize MDX by replacing Markdown elements with our own MDX components. In the process, we’ll introduce the concept of “shortcodes” when using those components.

As a heads up, the code … Read article “Working With MDX Custom Elements and Shortcodes”

The post Working With MDX Custom Elements and Shortcodes appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

Online Resource

Australia. Parliament. Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, author, issuing body

Dingman, Roger

Join us for the next Topics in Preservation Series lecture:

Cartography and Code: Incorporating Automation in the Comparison of Medieval Toponyms Across Maps

Wednesday, May 16, 2018
1:30 pm EDT

Library of Congress James Madison Memorial Building
Pickford Theater (third floor)

Register for the live webcast by Tuesday, May 15 at 5:00 pm. 

Click here for more information and to register for the live webcast.