SW Construction: Julia fastest-growing new programming language?

O "índice de macheza" da sua linguagem de programação, TIOBE Index, traz novidades:

Stats chart rapid rise in 2018 for Julia programming language
Is Julia fastest-growing new programming language? Stats chart rapid rise in 2018 | ZDNet

TOOL: Git Sparse Checkout

Git repos are cloned fully. And your disk space goes down the drain in this process (if you're working in a lot of complex projects). What if you need only a set of files from a repo? You can use a client (like the web-based bitbucket) to locate and download (one by one). Or enter Git Sparse Checkout:

Using Git Sparse Checkout

TOOL: Mapping between Enterprise Architect 12.1 menus and Enterprise Architect 13 ribbons

EA 12 to EA 13 changed locations of actions (menu)... To help you through the upgrade there is this very good resource:
Mapping between Enterprise Architect 12.1 menus and Enterprise Architect 13 ribbons

TOOLS: Pencil (rapid Prototyping tools - for mockups creation as well as live feature navigation)

A tool has been pointed out to me (free at the time of posting) and requiring installation (as opposed to some similar web-based tools):
https://pencil.evolus.vn/

Quoting:
"An open-source GUI prototyping tool that's available for ALL platforms.
Pencil is built for the purpose of providing a free and open-source GUI prototyping tool that people can easily install and use to create mockups in popular desktop platforms.
The latest stable version of Pencil is 3.0.4 which contains stability fixes and features a visual stencil builder. More details can be found in the release notes."

PS. About rapid prototyping (tools):
On Software Development (or "O Sr. SiIva disse..."): TOOLS: Rapid prototyping tools (for mockups creation as well as live feature navigation)

PS2. Also make sure to look at the MS tool (Sketchup in MS Expression Studio):
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee341458(v=expression.40).aspx

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee341449(v=expression.40).aspx

PS. Kudos to Vera Moreira for pointing this one out.

TOOL: CryptSync (to sinc to the cloud while encrypting)

CryptSync seems to be an interesting tool (to check) that encrypts whatever you sinc to the cloud (so if you account is hacked, data will be unreadable all the same):

CryptSync - Stefans Tools

SW Construction: Generators tutorial (Python)

http://www.dabeaz.com/generators/
(PDF presentation "inside")

Quoting:
"This tutorial discusses various techniques for using generator functions and generator expressions in the context of systems [read: command line script] programming. This topic loosely includes files, file systems, text parsing, network programming, and programming with threads."

Example source code in the link above (Python).

Agile: Planning Poker

https://www.planningpoker.com/

Software Construction: Scripting with Python

Every programmer shall have in its tricks bag competencies in some kind of scripting language. Along the way you'll have to know a way of automating repetitive tasks to save you and your team time (while building, deploying, testing, etc.).

Good candidates include Python (do you agree on that?): It's said to be simple and fast to learn as well as free:

1. https://www.python.org/
2. http://www.astro.up.pt/~sousasag/Python_For_Astronomers/Python_qr.pdf (cheat sheet)
3. https://perso.limsi.fr/pointal/_media/python:cours:mementopython3-english.pdf (cheat sheet)
4. http://lifehacker.com/keep-this-python-cheat-sheet-on-hand-when-learning-to-c-1655521825 (cheat sheet)
5. http://www.tecmint.com/the-truth-of-python-and-perl-features-pros-and-cons-discussed/ (Perl vs Python)

TOOLS: Time trackers - What are they and what are they good for (if anything)?

When doing software development it could be useful to track your time (split task types into categories) and start counting. Utilities with a start-stop interface are the less intrusive ones for this purpose.

We all know there's a difference between a plan and real-life execution (project plans, life plans, etc.). This is also valid for our daily plan (we do plan every day right?). If we do track time spent on our daily tasks most of us will for sure be surprised how differently we spend our time (when compared to our initial plan). In software engineering, for your projects, Project Monitoring and Control, helps us keeping projects (and its plans) on track. What about in your life? The % of effective time spent working sometimes is radically different from our first mental guess (and maybe this is why time runs out without things getting done: because we are NOT doing it).

But we mustn't panic: Typically it is normal that we don't spend 100% of the time working but do you know your %? This is because there are context changes as well as several types of interruptions including meetings, phone calls and many other asynchronous events that will make you stop te current task (and incur into new context changes). Also, this is why we should never plan 100% of our time fully.

Repeating the question: Do you know the average % of  time you are able to be productive?
If not, try using a time tracker for a week, so that you have the numbers. There are for sure published studies on this productivity topic (google is your friend) but only after having your own % number you can start thinking in optimizing the way you spend your day (you can only optimize what you can measure).

Some example of time trackers are listed in this article (mini-review):
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/6-free-and-useful-desktop-based-time-tracking-software/

My minimum requirements for such a tool are:
- that's in your budget (mine is zero, so I look for freeware)
- that allows you to define task categories (don't try to track individual tasks, unless you really need to); things like, analysis, coding, testing, meetings, [coffee] break (if you're doing SW development);
- that has a start/stop interface (a plus would be to pause tracking time when the screen saver enters in action - I don't know many people that are able to work while the screen saver is running)
- that presents you some reporting on the collected data (charts, dashboards - per day, week, month)
- that exports data to CSV/XLS format (for further analysis, if needed)
You could have additional requirements, e.g. "has a web interface" but for me this is not required.

PS. For personal productivity tips (not properly related to tools) you could try these:
http://umdiadestesvou.blogspot.pt/2016/09/um-dia-destes-vou-testar-mais-dicas-de.html

TOOL: Mind maps online - Mindmup

A fully online (works with keyboard only) for creating (and exporting) mind maps. Integrates with Google Drive and exports to PDF, PNG and Freemind (*.mm) format:

https://www.mindmup.com/

Whenever Freemind or X-Mind is not installed but ideas break (and you have a browser and WWW access available).

(@2016-11-17: Added X-Mind link)

TOOL: Screen shot grabber - Shotty - Overview

Yet another screen shot grabber: Shotty - Overview

Shotty allows you to temporarily host the screen shots under http://images.devs-on.net/en/Default.aspx and a few more providers.

PS. Not to be used if you want to store evidences after the software development project closure (development phase, testing phase) but good enough for some projects where you merely want to attach a screen shot to an issue and you don't have a file server with a network share available to do it.

TOOLS: Intermission: Mouse without borders

In this intermission I give you: "Mouse without borders". To be more exact it's Microsoft that gives you the utility for free here:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35460

Grab it while you can (not that I believe that it will stop being free).

To Install and Configure it

You only need to download the utility on 2 computers, run (your favorite AV and then run) the setup; use the host name and software-generated key (that you'll have to write down in the second computer); after that the master computer performs a quick location config (so that "the mouse knows where to go").

What's it good for?

This is a productivity tool that allows you sharing a same mouse (and keyboard) in several computers without having to be switching between those hardware devices.
You just need to say where the other computers are (physically, in relation to the "master computer") and the mouse will move there (without borders). The tool will allow you also to copy text (and files!) easily between (up to) 4 computers. 

It's useful for some of these scenarios: 

- Testing (if you record results on a system and you need to test interactively on another). Grab text from that error on one place and paste it on the place you have the test management tool. Precious time saving.

- Programming: when you need to deploy files on servers or other Windows boxes.

- Whenever you have 2 PCs on your desk and you need to frequently change from one to another.

- (fill in your scenarios here). 

AOB

Another tool that works well is Synergy (and this is cross-platform).

(2016-04-21: Rephrases; added cross platform info)