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Kathy Sierra

Kathy Sierra is the coauthor of Head First Java and Head First EJB. She has been interested in learning theory since her days as a game developer. More recently, she's been a master trainer for Sun Microsystems, teaching Sun's java instructors how to teach the latest technologies to customers. Her current gig, along with her partner Bert Bates, is developing and producing the bizarre new Head First series of books for O'Reilly. She's also the original founder of javaranch.com, which came dangerously close to winning a Jolt Cola award last year, but had to settle for the computer equivalent of being the Miss America runner-up (winning the Software Development Magazine Productivity Award instead). She likes to think about thinking (as opposed to actually DOING it), and blogs from time to time about metacognition, why having fun MATTERS, and why being an "individual contributor" (as Scott McNealy puts it) is way better than being a "manager".

 

Weblogs

The JavaOne Store Metric
This is a picture of the JavaOne store on the last day: Javaonestore

(The...

JavaOne trend spotting... sort of.
JavaOne talks are full of numbers... 1 billion JavaCards, 550 worldwide Java user groups, 912 members of the JCP, 28 J2EE compliant app servers, 45,000 Java applications for cell phones, 78% of...
JavaOne mood: surprisingly festive
The old optimism is still here in San Francisco. Sure we've heard it all before: the huge HUGE "opportunity" in mobile, the "renewed commitments" with other big players like IBM, and "the really...
Java True Confessions
As I'm sitting here packing for JavaOne 2005, I'm remembering an event from last year that was... scary. It was one of Gilad Bracha's sessions on generics. (Gilad...
Does it really matter if your tool is cool?
Brett's blog on Java's declining cool factor created quite a stir: Ho Hum Java. I'd sum up a lot of the comments...
JavaOne Jini session MUCH larger than I expected...
Two good Jini moments today at JavaOne:
1) Scott McNealy gives out a Dukie award to Orbitz, with an obvious reference to what they're doing--it was the ConJINIality award! That's right. Jini...
Pair Programming is NOT always a choice

I know this subject has been talked about practically to death, but from what I have read, there's an assumption about Pair Programming that I believe... no, I know is Just Plain...

How are you on a blind date?

Maybe your mother knows more about software development than you ever imagined. Perhaps the advice she gave you before that fateful blind date--with that special someone your friends convinced you...

To API designers/spec developers: pity those of us who have to LEARN this...

There have been some interesting and useful discussions and guidelines on API design from people like Steven Clarke and...

What's so bad about making it easier to learn Java?

I was talking with author Dori Smith recently, and it turns out we both experienced a similar phenomenon: angry email and online posts about how we were making it too easy to learn Java. But is...

MIDP 2.0 is just too much fun.
I've spent the last few weeks playing with the Wireless Toolkit and MIDP 2.0. I've been in EJB-land for the last several years, so it's quite a shock going from big ol' gravel-hauling apps where it...
Rekindle your passion for programming

I'm sitting here at MacWorld Expo in San Francisco. I flew more than a thousand miles to get here, and I'm paying for it out of my own pocket. Why? Because it gets me excited. I'm surrounded by...

Have your developers seen a real customer in the wild?

A couple of years ago, I addressed an all-hands meeting for a small division of a Very Big Computer Company I Won't Name. This little division had just over 100 employees. I began with a single...