Bruce Eckel talks about the departure of the hyper-enthusiasts, to which Steve Yegge responds with a little anti-anti-hype. He then finishes in a post called Bambi Meets Godzilla.

Quoth Jamis:

Ok, I’m putting out a few feelers here for people that would be interested in helping to test a nascent Basecamp API. The documentation is currently minimal, and you would be well-served by having a bit of Ruby experience (because that’s what the documentation is, currently). Also, we would ask that you not distribute details about the API. If you are interested, please email [me]. No promises you’ll get to help, though — it all depends on how many (or how few) people volunteer.

I’m not currently a Basecamp user (although I have tried it out), but having a usable API might be what gets me to take another serious look at it. It’s a great tool as it is, with a very slick interface. Allowing me to write some scripts to automate things would just be too cool.

Sounds like some sort of polite NDA will be in effect, which is entirely understandable. If you are interested, Jamis’ email address is in the original post. I didn’t want to repost it here.

Update: Jason Fried says, “API is 90% done. Hang tight everyone. It’s on deck.”

The kind people at ActiveState are currently giving away free licenses of Komodo Personal Edition.

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Go here and click the Buy button for Komodo Personal Edition. (Offer not valid for Pro edition)
2. Enter the promo code kmd3n9-ur8 and update your cart. If it worked, you’ll see that cost is now $0.00.
3. Hit the Checkout button and fill in your information. You will receive your license via email, so be sure to enter your address correctly.
4. Follow the instructions in the email you receive.

That’s it! You’ll have a full version of Komodo Personal Edition at no cost to you. The only catch is that the offer ends December 31, 2005… that’s tomorrow.

Also, in case you’ve never heard of it, Komodo is an IDE for Python, Ruby, PHP, Perl, and Tcl development. It works in Windows, Linux, and OS X. I installed it tonight for the first time (free, as above) and it looks great! Definitely better than Eclipse IMHO, and a little prettier than SPE. Definitely recommended.

Hat tip to Jacques Marneweck for the link.

Update: Corrected the date above. It should read December 31, 2005, not 2006. But according to Mateusz in the comments, it still works.