Not extraordinary. Extra-ordinary. As in, its ordinariness abounds. — I like ChatGPT. A lot. It’s the best digital writing assistant I’ve ever used. If my time using ChatGPT has taught me anything, though, it’s that ChatGPT isn’t a brilliant writer. I’m not worried about my job. …

An interview with Python and pandas trainer Matt Harrison — Python trainer Matt Harrison has been creating a bit of a stir. Some of his pandas examples, like the one below, have elicited emotional responses from different folks in the Twitterverse:

How to embrace absurdity and unlock more creative coding — This might sound crazy, but… I like to practice having ridiculous ideas. I pick a problem or a question and brainstorm absurd solutions. Anything goes, no matter how crazy. This is particularly fun to do with code. And it’s not just for diversion. Practicing absurdity helps solve real-world coding problems. Have fun and boost creativity …

A simple and powerful framework for ironing out confusing code — Everyone wants to write clean code. There are whole books about it! But you don’t need to read a book to write cleaner code right now. There’s one “trick” that every coder can learn to make their code less confusing. The key is this: Every Line Does Only One Thing One line, one task. But don’t…

Who is reading your docs? — Docs can make or break a product. Documentation is the second most important factor developers use for deciding which database to use, according to the 2022 State of Databases survey. …

How to quickly install and set up a professional Julia environment — Need to get up and running with Julia fast? This guide walks you through setting up a professional Julia development environment step-by-step. You’ll learn how to: Install Julia with juliaup. Set up the Julia VS Code extension. Create a shared dev environment with common development tools. Write a startup.jl file…

And how defensive copying can protect you from badly behaving code — Have you ever loaned something to someone only to have it returned to you in a different state? I saw this exact situation play out this week at work. A user reported that an SDK method, which involved a sequence of API calls, was failing after the first call. …

How to get more done in less time with chunking — I’m not big on New Year’s resolutions, but I made one this year. I decided to keep it simple: Do more of the things that make me happy, and less of the things that don’t. But, this isn’t about my new year’s resolution. Well, not directly. It’s about the word…

One simple way to improve your code’s testability and reusability — Hang out with Python devs long enough, and you’ll hear all about Tim Peter’s Zen Of Python. The Zen, which you can conveniently read by executing import this in a Python REPL, presents 19 of the 20 guiding principles behind Python's design. …