Table of contents
Apologies, dear reader. The previous two weeks have been a flurry of activity, whose result was the postponement of this collection of entertainments. It was remiss of me, and I beg your understanding.
Speaking of understanding, I am quite unsure of what to make of this older article from the Atlantic. I myself completed an Engineering degree and must agree that I often find the rigour lacking in the Software industry. As it happens, many countries (including Australia and Canada) consider Engineering a Chartered profession, thus describing all technologists as such is not only wrong, it may even breach the boundaries of legality.
My uncertainty arises from the unpleasantness of contradicting someone's identity, along with the faint whiff of snobbery engendered therein... But there is something to be said for dis-allowing people to use well understood titles if they are unwilling to fulfil the obligations therein.
Speaking also of titles, it is a sad day for many in the Commonwealth countries, including the Gentlehacker. I think perhaps it is that, regardless of some substantial failings in the institute of Monarchy, the Queen herself seemed to treat being Monarch as a position of service, and lived her life accordingly. I greatly respect how diligent she was in her attempts to service the emotional needs of her subjects; for strength, for comfort, for unity and a sense of belonging to something great.
She will be missed. Vale, your Majesty Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor. Rest in Peace.
For Developers
Community
Hacktoberfest
Impends. Hacktoberfest, a month-long virtual hackathon, encourages folks of all persuasions to collaborate on open-source projects. Despite some... regrettable happenings... in earlier years, Digital Ocean's event provides a wonderful opportunity to contribute to Open Source.
Additionally, the design of the website is wonderful.
Convenience
Automatic Key Vaulting for Everyone
Simon Sickle has written a guide, demonstrating how you can store keys in 1password and have them automatically synced to your terminal. Clever Lad.
Design
ASCII Diagrams
Bring back the old days of funny-symbol-only diagrams, with Asciiflow, a lovely free diagramming tool. It's simple to use, although the options currently are a little basic.
Micro-Animations
Micro-Animations are those which provide your users with helpful feedback that their actions have been noticed. Here is a tidy little guide on implementing them using Anime-JS.
Open Source Design System
Penpot is a web-based, open source design system for cross-domain teams, and looks very pleasant. The Gentlehacker would try it in a heartbeat, if he had any kind of design skill whatsoever.
Machine Learning
AWS Visual Conversation Builder
The Zaibatsu has released a visual conversation builder for Amazon Lex, thus enabling no-code chatbot/assistant building. Quite neat.
For everyone
FLYING CAR
THIS IS NOT A DRILL
The future has finally arrived! Samson Sky's Flying Car has passed FAA Approval!
Yes, it requires a conversion step to go between Road and Air vehicle, but it's a step in the right direction and the beginning of the fulfillment of the promise of future times. The Future has been a disappointment thus far. Let me have this, I beg you.
Edifying Reading
Upon Serverless Applications, and Sessions Thereof
I have recently begun a series on Building an API for Serverless App Sessions, of which I'm rather proud.
Therein, I discuss using API Gateway, DynamoDB and Lambda to build a flexible session authentication system. Features include separate Web and API authentication, session expiry, and extensibility for differing permissions (inc. authentication delegation).
I would appreciate a share and follow.
For Usability
Usability expert Jacob Nielsen recommends you Stop Listening to Users.
With Thanks
Should you have enjoyed this edition of The Week That Was, I would greatly appreciate you sharing with your fellows, or a Subscription or Follow over on My Web Log.
Should you wish to find previous entries, you shall find them all collected here.