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qxb's comments

qxb | 14 years ago | on: Ask HN: How do you deal with the isolation of telecommuting?

I think mzbridget and krsgoss make sensible suggestions elsehwere in the comments. On the topic of work/life balance, I'd add: try your hardest to "close the door" on your workspace when you've finished for the day. If you have a home office and can do this literally, then even better.

On the topic of having the same routine as if you worked in an office, I heard somebody once say that they left the house before work and walked round the block, rain or shine, to simulate a morning commute. They said it helped create the mindset mzbridget mentions (point 1).

qxb | 14 years ago | on: The Ruby Reading List

My first two steps: I started from nothing with Pine's Learn to Program, and then moved on to Learn Ruby the Hard Way.

http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/

After you've got the basics, the best way to learn is to have a problem to solve or need to address. About halfway through LRTHW I started making notes on little programs I could try to build once I'd finished the course. None were very original: a custom contacts book, a script that scraped football scores and added them to a text file, a simple single-serving website that told me the weather for my area. My learning spiralled out from there.

Finally, this is an online version of the famous Pickaxe book, which I found to be a good reference. I wouldn't recommend it as a first port of call if you're new to programming, but once the terminology (object, class, method, variable etc) has sunk in it's useful for looking things up.

http://ruby-doc.org/docs/ProgrammingRuby/

Have fun!

qxb | 14 years ago | on: Show HN: I launched my first solo side project

Updating a spreadsheet with quantities of desk lamps and keyboards sounds painfully familiar.

I would target businesses. Here's something to consider. With a home user, you first have to convince the potential customer of the benefits of keeping an inventory. Then you have to persuade them to use your service over a competing one, or a spreadsheet, or pen and paper. Then you have to convince them to pay you for your service, presumably, at some point in the future.

Keeping an inventory is already an established practice for businesses, so that first home user hurdle is cleared. You just have the remaining two: explaining why iKeepm is better than struggling with a spreadsheet (photos and reports are two features that spring to mind for me straight away) and getting people to pay. My hunch is that businesses, already persuaded of the need to keep an inventory, would be more ready to pay than home users.

qxb | 14 years ago | on: Show HN: I launched my first solo side project

Congratulations. I think this is a neat little service. I could certainly see a market outside the domestic one, too. I've worked for small businesses and public sector organisations where maintaining an inventory of office equipment was necessary not just for insurance, but also for funding and auditing purposes.

Best of luck.

qxb | 14 years ago | on: Ask HN: critique my blog?

I like it. I am a big fan of simple, straightforward webdesign that focuses on content.

Without looking at your source code, my only quibble is: remove the underlining from "posts". Everything else on the page that's underlined is a link, and that isn't.

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