Since today, some of my professional writing is finally public, in the form of an article explaining the major concepts of Git. This is a companion "making of" article.

Today was my last working day at FARFETCH. I found myself sharing two stories at the office that had an impact on colleagues.

For the first time, the Global Editors Network brought to Portugal the EditorsLab friendly competition, in association with Google and the Portuguese Publishers Association (APImprensa). The competition happened at CENJOR, February 26 and 27th, 2015.

Competing teams comprise a journalist, a designer and a developer. I was invited to participate …

As I clean my desk at Altitude Software in the week before my final dismissal, I stumble across my old ID card for “Clube EASYPHONE”. I can hardly recognize myself in the photo. I've lost that beard years ago! Where did that 30-year old boy from 1998 go?

It was …

See What I Mean: how to use comics to communicate ideas
By Kevin Cheng
Rosenfeld Media, 2012
ISBN: 978-1933820279

This is a small book that ultimately got me to dabble with comics professionally, as a means to convey technical information. The book is small enough and practical enough to ever …

For a technical writer, what is content strategy? And is content strategy relevant if you are not a consultant?

I watched as the new the term "content strategy" appeared and then evolved at the list contentstrategy@googlegroups.com since 2009, and I kept thinking that all these clever people were …

To announce the presentation The Birth of a Company-Wide Wiki at Organização 2.0, Ana Neves did an interview and then wrote a case study in Portuguese.

Her interview clarifies some details of the story.

The Pentium Chronicles: the people, passion, and politics behind Intel's Landmark Chips
By Robert P. Colwell
Wiley-IEEE Press, 2006
ISBN 978-0-471-73617-2

You would imagine that a large company such as Intel would be extremely well organized... yet Bob recalls how the Pentium chip started to be designed in a storage …

The Social Life of Information
By John Seely Brown, Paul Duguid
Harvard Business School Press, 2000
ISBN 0-87584-762-5

Fascinating stories of people using newly invented technology at Xeroc PARC, such as the notebook, the local ethernet network, the word processor, and even the humble photocopiers. Because "The logic of information …

The Seven Deadly Sins of Management
by Jonathan Ellis and René Tissen
Profile Books, 2003
ISBN 1-86197-526-0

I read this book in the Summer of 2003, after the NASDAQ bubble burst that took part of Altitude Software with it. The book explains how good ideas can go bad and, in …

The Tom Peters Seminar: Crazy times call for crazy organizations
By Tom Peters
Vintage, 1994
ISBN 978-0679754930

The book features many examples of unexpected ways to organize work towards satisfying customers. The examples are delightful. I started to see excellence in the small things, and learned to seek excellence in …

Ackoff's Fables: irreverent reflections on business and bureaucracy
Russell L. Ackoff
John Willey & Sons, 1991
ISBN 0-471-53194-4

Russel Ackoff was an American that also worked in India and taught in Mexico. He retells stories from those three cultures, including the US Navy, and then reflects on them.

This was another …

The Third Wave
By Alvin and Heidi Toffler
Random House Publishing Group, 1980
ISBN 9780688035976

I read the Portuguese edition of this book together with my wife during our 1999 Summer vacations in Nazaré. We both found the book delightful. The Tofflers explain history as a sequence of technological waves …

The Leader-Manager: Guidelines for Action
by William D. Hitt
IEEE Press, 1988
ISBN 935470409

This was my first book about management. I bought it as soon as it became apparent that I might became a manager later on, which means that I bought it in 1997 and probably read it …

Smalltalk-80: Bits of History, Words of Advice
By Glenn Krasner (editor)
Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1983
ISBN 0-201-11669-3

This collection of papers reports how different teams tried to implement Smalltalk-80 in different environments. Some chapters read like novels, and at the time I was astonished at the variety of approaches and …