I mentioned Friday that I've completely refactored the section of the Inner Drive Extensible Architecture™—the Idea™—that handles quantitative functions. (I've also decided to make some SDK documentation available.) The actual design of the IMeasurable classes—Length, Speed and the like—bears more discussion.

Usability guru Jakob Nielsen has a new column today reminiscing about the hype of 1997 because it's back in vogue:

The fads and big deals that get the press coverage are not important for running a workhorse website. To serve your customers, it's far better to emphasize simplicity and quality than to chase buzzwords.

There is endless coverage of a few atypical stories in the trade press, mainstream media, and even on specialized Internet-focused websites. Once again, it's worth remembering: your site is different from the ones in big stories. Focus on fixing the basics to get a simple and communicative website. Simple steps don't get hyped, but they drive much more business value for the average site than the issues that everyone writes about.

He includes a sidebar about the fads of 1997 and how they're doing today.

Krugman weighs in (sub.req.) on the immigration debate roiling the GOP:

For now, at least, the immigration issue is mainly hurting the Republican Party, which is divided between those who want to expel immigrants and those who want to exploit them. The only thing the two factions seem to have in common is mean-spiritedness.

Nicely put.

Appyhay Aprilhay Oolsfay Aday!

(Evenhay ymay eatherway itesay ishay inhay hetay piritsay.)

In January, I wrote about framework classes I was working on, and how I wanted to simplify the Inner Drive Extensible Architecture™. I followed up in February with a conundrum concerning how to model the problem. It turned out to be tricky, and time-consuming, and considering I wrote most of it at The Peddler's Daughter in Nashua, N.H., there was a lot of Smithwick's Ale[1] involved.

But today, at last, I've got a new demo.

The demo page has a lengthy explanation of how the new version works, and includes a bunch of source code showing how simple the stuff is to use and to extend. I still have a little polishing to do, but I'll probably be putting the full SDK documentation for the IDEA™ up on the Inner Drive website later this month.

I think this is some of the coolest stuff I've ever written.

[1] I would have linked to the official Diageo site, but it's so annoyingly badly written—it whisks you away to a page requiring your birthdate and it tries to cookie you—that on principle I won't have that as the primary link to this product.

One final quick hit for the morning: I completely forgot that yesterday was the 25th (25rd?) anniversary of President Reagan's attempted assassination. It's hard to grasp that it was that long ago.

I got a mailing from my undergrad alumni association exhorting me to go to the "23th Annual Dutch Festival." I last went to the 9rd one, or maybe the 10st, so I may just have to visit.

One of my fans sent me this Passover-themed link. Share and enjoy.

I'm back in Chicago for the weekend, where today it's 20°C (68°F) and sunny. To some readers in other parts of the world (see, for example, this list) that may not sound like anything interesting, but for me it means I seem to have a number of errands to run in the neighborhood...

The next North American total solar eclipse will be in 2017. Today it's Africa's turn.

Well, this is interesting. MSNBC is reporting this hour that White House Chief of Staff Andy Card has resigned, to be repleced by Budget Director Josh Bolten.

There's a privacy bug in Mozilla that has ended at least one relationship.

By Joyce Appleby and Gary Hart.

Joyce Appleby is professor emerita of history at UCLA and co-director of the History News Service. Gary Hart is a former U.S. senator and Wirth Chair in the Graduate School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado, Denver.

From today's Washington Post:

Sewage Tested for Signs of Cocaine

Fairfax Participating In Federal Program To Assess Drug Use

Earlier this month, [Fairfax County, Va.,] agreed to participate in a White House pilot program to analyze wastewater from communities throughout the Potomac River Basin for the urinary byproducts of cocaine.

No, uh, kidding.