News

All these people griping about how writing software isn't fun anymore probably didn't notice that here in the northern hemisphere, we're only about a week away from the shortest day of the year. Install some bright lights, drink some coffee, take a vacation in Tahiti, and tell me in April if you still think software development is depressing.

Google Suggest

I had to change my home page back to regular Google due to a fairly blatant usability bug in Google Suggest. Repro steps:

1. Move your mouse so it's over the "Google Search" button
2. Type "Joel"
3. Click the mouse button immediately

The bug: often, the timing is such that the Google Suggest popup appears after I type Joel but before I click the mouse, so I think I'm clicking on the "Google Search" button intending to search for, say, Joel, not that I would search for myself, after all, I'm right here, but I'm really clicking on the popup listbox item for "Joel Turner", whoever that is. Any relation to Tina? Or Bachman?

I still think Google Suggest is important—I'm sure they'll fix this little problem. It's important not for searching, but because it's going to teach web users to expect highly responsive user interfaces:

• If you have a website that shows a map, and the user clicks to zoom in, they're going to expect the map to zoom in, quickly—they will no longer tolerate the full-page-reload-and-scroll-to-the-top that Mapquest has conditioned them to accept.
• If you show a list, and let people click on the column headers to sort by different columns, they're no longer going to tolerate the full-page-reload-and-scroll-to-the-top that certain unnamed bug tracking applications have conditioned them to accept.
• If you have an email application, and you show people a list of email and give them a button to delete email as spam, they're going to expect virtually instantaneous response time, not the full-page-reload-and-scroll-to-the-top that most web email programs have conditioned them to accept.

That's what I meant by "raising the bar."

More Google

Attention, FogBugz competitors: a court has ruled that you are welcome to continue to advertise your products when people search for FogBugz on Google. I actually don't think there's anything wrong with this although it does show a certain lack of class, mm, don't you think? You don't see Wal*Mart advertising when you search for Tiffany.

Oh, and by the way: My company, Fog Creek Software, has paid internships in software development for qualified college students. They're in New York City. Free housing, lunch, and more. And you get to work on real, shipping software with the smartest developers in the business.

About the Author: I’m your host, Joel Spolsky, a software developer in New York City. Since 2000, I've been writing about software development, management, business, and the Internet on this site. For my day job, I run Fog Creek Software, makers of FogBugz—the smart bug tracking software with the stupid name, and Fog Creek Copilot—the easiest way to provide remote tech support over the Internet, with nothing to install or configure.

Enter your email address to receive a (very occasional) email whenever I write a major new article. You can unsubscribe at any time, of course.