Joel Spolsky began his legendary web log, www.joelonsoftware.com, in March 2000, in order to offer insights for improving the world of programming. Spolsky based these observations on years of personal experience. The result just a handful of years later? Spolsky's technical knowledge, caustic wit, and extraordinary writing skills have earned him status as a programming guru! His blog has become renowned throughout the programming worldnow linked to more than 600 websites and translated into over 30 languages. Joel on Software covers every conceivable aspect of software programming—from the best way to write code, to the best way to design an office in which to write code! All programmers, all people who want to enhance their knowledge of programmers, and all who are trying to manage programmers will surely relate to Joel's musings. Table of Contents Choosing a Language Back to Basics The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code The Absolute Minimum Every Software Developer Absolutely, Positively Must Know About Unicode and Character Sets (No Excuses!) Painless Functional Specifications Part 1: Why Bother? Painless Functional Specifications Part 2: What’s a Spec? Painless Functional Specifications Part 3: But . . . How? Painless Functional Specifications Part 4: Tips Painless Software Schedules Daily Builds Are Your Friend Hard-Assed Bug Fixin’ Five Worlds Paper Prototyping Don’t Let Architecture Astronauts Scare You Fire and Motion Craftsmanship Three Wrong Ideas from Computer Science Biculturalism Get Crash Reports From Users—Automatically! The Guerilla Guide to Interviewing Incentive Pay Considered Harmful Top Five (Wrong) Reasons You Don’t Have Testers Human Task Switches Considered Harmful Things You Should Never Do, Part One The Iceberg Secret, Revealed The Law of Leaky Abstractions Lord Palmerston on Programming Measurement Rick Chapman Is In Search of Stupidity What Is the Work of Dogs in This Country? Getting Things Done When You’re Only a Grunt Two Stories Big Macs vs. The Naked Chef Nothing Is As Simple As It Seems In Defense of Not-Invented-Here Syndrome Strategy Letter I: Ben & Jerry’s vs. Amazon Strategy Letter II: Chicken-and-Egg Problems Strategy Letter III: Let Me Go Back! Strategy Letter IV: Bloatware and the 80/20 Myth Strategy Letter V: The Economics of Open Source A Week of Murphy’s Law Gone Wild How Microsoft Lost the API War Microsoft Goes Bonkers Our .NET Strategy Please Sir May I Have a Linker?