DPL Reading List – December 30, 2015
Here are some of the articles we’ve been reading around this office this week.
How To Fix A Bad User Interface (Thanks to Jarrod Wubbels for recommending this article) – “Have you ever experienced a user interface that feels lifeless? Have you created a UI that just seems to be missing…something? If that’s the case, you’ve probably experienced a case of Awkward UI.”
10 Entrepreneurs’ Productivity Secrets (Thanks to Brian Zimmer for recommending this article) – “Whether you’re looking for a productivity app or a podcast to download, most of us ask our network for a recommendation. Why read a random website review when someone in your network has an opinion? Do the number of app downloads really matter if someone you trust loves a product? In the digital-age default of leveraging a network, when I wanted to know the apps, conferences, and podcasts startup founders are using as they take on the challenges of scaling their ventures (while trying to keep their sanity), I turned to a select group of founders in my network for recommendations.”
Silicon Valley Needs You, But Isn’t Willing To Pay Enough (Thanks to Matt Babcock for recommending this article) – “Nearly two-thirds of those hiring managers and recruiters said the salary guidelines at their companies prevent positions from being filled. What that means is they can’t pay prospective employees enough to sign on the dotted line. That’s up from 58 percent last year.”
Are You Trying To Solve the Wrong Problem? – “If you are caught in a problem that seems unsolvable, ask this simple question: If the problem you’re trying to solve weren’t the problem, what else might be?”
7 Signs You’re Doing Devops Wrong (Thanks to Nathan Wilkinson for recommending this article) – “Devops is a transformative ethos that many companies are putting to their advantage. As with anything that hinges on culture, however, it can be too easy to slap together a few tools, sprinkle in new processes, and call yourself a devops-fueled organization. After all, saying that your company embraces devops and regularly practices devops techniques is popular nowadays, and it can serve as great PR for bringing in great talent to your team. But in truth, many companies — and technical recruiters — that are proclaiming their devotion to devops from the hilltops aren’t really devops organizations.”
What I Learned About Product Design This Year (Thanks to Jarrod Wubbels for recommending this article) – “2015 was a humbling year for me. In September of 2014, I joined a tiny but established startup called SproutVideo as their third employee and first designer. The role interests me because it affords the opportunity to see how design can grow a solid product with a loyal user-base into something even better.”
Facebook’s Open-Sourcing Of AI Hardware Is The Start Of The Deep-Learning Revolution – “Open-sourcing Facebook’s AI hardware means that deep learning has graduated from the Facebook Artificial Intelligence Research (FAIR) lab into Facebook’s mainstream production systems intended to run apps created by its product development teams. If Facebook software developers are to build deep-learning systems for users, a standard hardware module optimised for fast deep learning execution that fits into and scales with Facebook’s data centres needs to be designed, competitively procured, and deployed. The module, called Big Sur, looks like any rack mounted commodity hardware unit found in any large cloud data centre.”
