Playing with new technologies

[Lori Piquet]

How often do you take time to "play" with new technologies? When you do
learn new things, is it more often on the job, when you're under the gun, or
do you learn more often at home, on your own time? Are there certain
techniques that help you tackle a new technology?

(Question refers to this week's featured opinion:
http://www.devx.com/devx/editorial/10432.)

Lori Piquet
Editor-in-chief
DevX

[Eddie Burdak]

Lori,

Lori Piquet wrote:

:: How often do you take time to "play" with new technologies?

Not a lot to be fair - but then agian ususally it doesn't offer
anything more to me and my work.

::When you
:: do learn new things, is it more often on the job, when you're under
:: the gun, or do you learn more often at home, on your own time?

Uusally it all starts at home and I take it from there. There was one
exception which was to learn at work under the cosh

:: Are there certain techniques that help you tackle a new technology?

Yes - "What does it offer, What will it mean for me, What cost
(learning, implimentation, distribution, "certification",
compatibility....)

Eddie

::
:: (Question refers to this week's featured opinion:
:: http://www.devx.com/devx/editorial/10432.)
::
:: Lori Piquet
:: Editor-in-chief
:: DevX

[Laurent]

I am not a profesional developer but still have achieved to be MCSD certified.
I love learning new technology and I am doing that at spare time. The learning
method proposed by Russel using a defined problem have drawbacks. It is obvious
that practicing and testing is needed but there are often many ways to solve
a problem. You need at least to know that those different ways exists and
think about their differences.
Certainly if you are an experienced programer like Russel you have a sound
understanding of the computing abstraction and can then put the new technology
in context and choose the right method. For intermediate developer, you need
to get the structure of the new technology first. What will be the result
if you get a dictionary and a grammar book and start writting a love letter
in a foreign language?
I think Russel other advices, reading and practicing, are more important
(eventhough it takes more time.)

Best regards

Laurent

[Rob Abbe]

Lori,

I try to apply technology to my everyday life as much as possible. For me
it's still as much of a hobby as it was when I was in my teen years. I think
it used to be this way for a lot of people until it became the way they earn
their living.

Sometimes it's so easy to get wound up in business programming problems,
that one will overlook how technology can be used to just to make your family
seem closer together. Last July my wife and I had our first child. Since
our family is so spread out accross many states, I mounted an X10 cam to
the crib, so that the grandparents and other family members could get a "live"
snapshot of the baby while he was sleeping. It was a great expierience,
since I had never programmed linux before.

Since then I've discovered what a great platform the Mac is for digital editing.

Rob


"Lori Piquet" <lpiquet@devx.com> wrote:
>How often do you take time to "play" with new technologies? When you do
>learn new things, is it more often on the job, when you're under the gun,
or
>do you learn more often at home, on your own time? Are there certain
>techniques that help you tackle a new technology?
>
>(Question refers to this week's featured opinion:
>http://www.devx.com/devx/editorial/10432.)
>
>Lori Piquet
>Editor-in-chief
>DevX
>
>

[Dave Mo]

I'd like to add a resource to Mr. Jones' list that I've found very useful
and affordable over the years - Industry and Trade technical magazines and
publications. Yep, good 'ol paper and ink hardcopy. Generally I've found
that articles on information I was seeking were very well writen and easy
to understand even for novice or neophytes and include charts and pretty
pictures if nothing else. "Learning Through Osmosis", I call it. The bonus
is that you can generally get subscriptions to these publications for FREE!
And they're relatively easy to get after some initial work. I get nearly
a dozen of them at any one time on all sorts of topics from software development
and programing to business developement to video editing and offers for other
free subscriptions all the time.

No, you probably won't gain a mastery of any new technology directly from
this method, at least not right away, I sure haven't, but you WILL eventually
learn and understand more about whatever it is you're interested in as well
as gaining a better overall idea of what's out there and how it all works
together. Plus you'll ALWAYS have something to read while on the toilet or
waiting for that program to compile.

Reply to this posting if you'd like more info on my technique for the subscription
process.

Peace - Dave

"Lori Piquet" <lpiquet@devx.com> wrote:
>How often do you take time to "play" with new technologies? When you do
>learn new things, is it more often on the job, when you're under the gun,
or
>do you learn more often at home, on your own time? Are there certain
>techniques that help you tackle a new technology?
>
>(Question refers to this week's featured opinion:
>http://www.devx.com/devx/editorial/10432.)
>
>Lori Piquet
>Editor-in-chief
>DevX
>
>