The Toilet Paper

A new summary of a scientific paper without the boring sciencey bits, (almost) every week. Ideal for bathroom and other types of breaks.

A worker whose head has turned into a literal bomb with a lit fuse looks very unhappy.

What makes developers tick (like a time bomb)

Happy workers are productive workers. Limiting unhappiness can be a good way to increase the happiness of your workers.

Talk show host with a small p*nis is angry about something

Defining the public value of public service media

Public service media exist because they provide value to the general public (who also happen to pay for them).

The rocket from the rocket emoji in space

Best practices for infrastructure-as-code (IaC) scripts

This week’s paper presents a catalogue of best practices for infrastructure as code programs.

“How is your thesis going?”

Many PhD students suffer from mental health issues. This study investigates the underlying reasons and explores potential interventions.

Enhancing the pull request experience with meta-bots

Pull request bots can provide both maintainers and contributors with a lot of useful information, but sometimes less is more.

Four identical Tetrarchs standing next to each other

Portrayal of Tetrarchic rule in the Roman Empire

For a long time, the Roman Empire was ruled by just one man. This all changed when emperor Diocletian ascended to the throne.

A flight attendant stands next to the open door of an aeroplane

Effectively onboarding newcomers into agile project teams

A qualitative case study shows how we can design a smooth onboarding experience for agile software development teams.

Two people staring at a TV that shows a PM5644 circle pattern with a lot of static noise

Proactively detect and fix flaky tests in your test suite

Proactive detection of NIO tests makes it possible to fix flaky tests before they ever cause any problems.

A piranha plant inside a green warp pipe

Make your hiring process a positive experience for everyone

Leaky hiring pipelines are expensive. This paper presents guidelines that can make them more transparent, fair, and inclusive.

Angry customer at IKEA ignores advice of salesperson

What makes a team good at Scrum?

Apparently a team is good at applying Scrum when it does what the Scrum guide says it should do.

Why is everyone on TikTok?

TikTok has become incredibly popular in a short time. What sets it apart from other platforms, other than its Chinese ownership?

A sheep in the Star Trek transporter room

Migrating pods between Kubernetes nodes (without killing them)

When you move a pod to another node, Kubernetes creates a new pod and kills the original. Is there a more humane way?

A remote worker shakes hands with an office worker

How to stimulate creativity and innovation in distributed journalistic teams

Psychological safety and good use of technology can make journalists more creative and innovative.

How to write good commit messages

In today’s “Things That People Don’t Want To Bother With” blog we’re having a look at commit messages and how to write them.

A bus is about to hit a pedestrian, who jumps away

Calculating the bus factor

The bus factor is a measure of how screwed a software project is when a member suddenly leaves. How should it be calculated?

Entitled short-haired Karen demands to speak with a manager

What does toxicity look like in open-source projects?

Toxicity in open source differs from toxicity on other platforms like Reddit or Wikipedia in unexpected ways.

Bad practices in continuous integration pipelines and processes

This catalogue of 79 bad smells can help you make your continuous integration processes less shitty.

A delivery driver carries a heavy log on their back

The product backlog

This paper shows that not every paper needs a long, overly descriptive title. It’s about product backlogs.

A container is sent through a stargate in space

Cargo-cult containerisation

Containers are often used for development and deployment of server-side software. For good reason or are we all just cargo culting?

A person holds a model aeroplane while standing on a runway. A descending plane can be seen in the distance.

Cargo cults in software engineering

Imitating others who are successful looks good on paper, but in reality only works when one understands the “why” behind those actions.

What does China’s foreign policy really look like?

In its foreign policy messages China claims that it all it wants is peaceful cooperation with other nations. Is it speaking the truth?

Visitors look at various works at an art gallery, which includes a framed paper.

Should scientific papers be written using Word or LaTeX?

Most papers are written using Microsoft Word or the LaTeX document preparation system. Is one better than the other?

A university professor hands out papers disguised as pamphlets to confused passers-by.

Science communication is a skill that needs to be taught

Computer science students are only taught how to communicate to an academic audience, which inconveniently excludes most developers.

Continuous integration practices (Taylor’s version)

This study suggests that continuous integration practices are kind of like Scrum, in the sense that everyone does something different.