Last night, I was at an outdoor theatre with Serena, watching Anatomy of a Fall (an excellent film). Outdoor theatres are becoming rare, which is a pity, and Arena del Sole is lovely with its strong vintage, 80s vibe. There’s little as pleasant as watching a film under the stars with your loved one on a quiet summer evening. Anyway, in the pause, I glanced at my e-mails and discovered I had been again granted the Microsoft MVP Award....

Write a lot. This is alpha and omega of writing advice, the beginning and the end, and it’s that way for a reason– I don’t know anyone who’s good writing who hasn’t also put in serious hours. – Nat Bennet

I’ve always loved libraries. They are a glimpse of the kind of ‘better world’ we all want to live in. That’s because by their very nature they are inclusive and welcoming. Anyone who walks through the doors of a library is reminded, just by inhaling the air of the library, just by being embraced by its atmosphere, to be a kinder and more caring person, and to forget, for a moment, the usual rules of our capitalistic society....

When I’m out hiking on my weekend hike I often spend much of the experience in contemplation. My thoughts are usually tickling at Warp 10, going everywhere possible at once, but then I ramp it back a bit and I just think about an assortment of topics at any given moment. Out in nature is really a good place for me to get things back into perspective, and I usually feel the better for it when I get back home....

The latest issue of The Economist focuses on solar energy. The introductory article is short, compelling, and optimistic. On the economics, they make a good point: Consider solar economics. As the cumulative production of a manufactured good increases, costs go down. As costs go down, demand goes up. As demand goes up, production increases—and costs go down further. This cannot go on for ever; production, demand or both always become constrained....

When you’re playing a point, it is the most important thing in the world. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you… This mindset is really crucial, because it frees you to fully commit to the next point… and the next one after that… with intensity, clarity and focus. The truth is, whatever game you play in life… sometimes you’re going to lose. A point, a match, a season, a job… it’s a roller coaster, with many ups and downs....

Charity Majors1 has a good, long-form article on the Stack Overflow blog. The title is misleading as, while AI’s impact on software engineering and its hiring process (spoiler: you’ll still want to hire junior engineers) is at the heart of the article, there’s so much more in it. It gets exciting in the second part, where she dispenses much from-the-trenches advice on team management and building. Hiring engineers is about composing teams....

I love this concise checklist on detecting fake experts, with which my experience wholeheartedly agrees. The first one: Imitators can’t answer questions at a deeper level. Specific knowledge is earned, not learned, so imitators don’t fully understand the ideas they’re talking about. Their knowledge is shallow. As a result, when you ask about details, first principles, or nonstandard cases, they don’t have good answers. For more advice, see the original post....

We’re doing a DevRomagna meetup on container security. It will happen on June 26 at 7pm, it will be in Italian, and the speaker will be the one and the only Ugo Lattanzi. Details and signup here.