free-variable.org – Programming stuff

Language style…

Fitting in

This article first appeared in PragPub back in 2016. This, what you hold in your hand, was almost the twelth article in my series on modern functional programming, which appeared…

Games

Mahjong – the best game you don’t play (and maybe should)

9 Jul 20209 Jul 2020

In recent months, I've fallen to a particular addiction - to the game of Mahjong. I like a range of games, from venerable heavy-weights like Go, through modern classics like…

Motherhood and apple pie

I'm full of flu and feeling quite grumpy, so what better time to unload on something that often annoys me? Today's target is that aura of "righteousness" that leads some people…

The FP Anthology book has just been printed!

I'm slightly pleased to announce that Programming: A PragPub Anthology has now been printed! My box of free copies arrived last week, fortunately coinciding with a parental visit (and gave me…

My older articles in PragPub

2 Aug 201721 Sep 2022

UPDATE: the original links no longer work, but some of the PragPub content from a range of authors is being added to Medium, see https://medium.com/@pragpub. See https://medium.com/search?q=callaghan+pragpub for a list…

I’ve written part of a book!

I'm pleased to announce that some of my earlier articles for the PragPub magazine will be published in a new anthology, which is available in Beta (e-Book) now and due to be…

Roman Numerals

I was recently at a FP-ish meetup group in Newcastle, and one topic of discussion is how to TDD the Roman Numerals kata. Note: for regular readers, TDD is generally…

I’m not writing a book

You might have noticed, still no book. Sorry about that. It got shelved early in 2014 for a number of reasons. A bit of running out of steam after a…

I’m writing a book!

I'm rather delighted to confirm that I'm now writing a book! You might have seen my articles in the Pragmatic Programmers' in-house magazine. (If not, start with this one from August 2012. There's eleven…

Mind the gap please

Or, how all programming language evolution charts are incomplete. Or even, how so many of you are looking the wrong way! Just a quick moan this time. No doubt you've all…