Bonus Schemes Should Be Handled with Care

I was recently chatting with a colleague about bonus schemes, and it occurred to me that every single company I've worked for (that's four, if we're counting) has implemented at least one such scheme, and the outcome is always the same: pissed-off employees.

There seems to be a kind of unquestioned assumption that employees want bonus schemes, and that employers are being good employers by introducing them. Such schemes are, without exception, described as being a "benefit". After all, who doesn't enjoy receiving a bonus with their pay cheque? What could possibly go wrong?

I'd like to argue that bonus schemes can go wrong. In fact, they are harmful more often than not, and should be handled with care.

Command-Line Subversion Tutorial, Part 3: Subversion Properties

In Part 1 of this series we looked at the basics of command-line Subversion, and Part 2 covered importing, branching and merging. In this third part I'd like to introduce a useful and very powerful Subversion feature, which isn't always terribly well understood by developers: that of Subversion Properties.

Some Thoughts on Solving Advanced Cryptic Crosswords

I've recently been enjoying - if that's the right word - advanced cryptic crosswords. These are those extra challenging puzzles that crop up in the weekend supplements of the broadsheet newspapers here in the UK.

Advanced cryptics aren't quite like normal crosswords. They tend to be set out on a "barred" grid, as opposed to the more familiar "black and white" version, they typically employ obscure or obsolete vocabulary, and they often feature "special instructions" in the preamble of the puzzle. For example, the solver may be expected insert or remove letters before writing in the grid entry, or resolve clashes between "across" and "down" answers. It can be a bit like solving a puzzle layered on top of a puzzle on top of a puzzle.

Examples of the genre include Inquisitor and Beelzebub in the Independent, Mephisto and The Listener in the Times, Enigmatic Variations in the Sunday Telegraph and, perhaps the father of them all, Azed in the Observer.

I'm not even close to being an expert on these, but I've picked up a few...er...clues over recent months, and I thought it couldn't hurt to share what I've found out so far, and perhaps see if readers have any further advice. So here are my thoughts on solving advanced cryptics.