So, first (and most obvious) point of interest. Your function "server" will not work. It contains "python -m SImpleHTTPServer .." .. Notice the typo? It should be SimpleHTTPServer. In addition, that other fluff around it is unneeded in general. Just "python -m SimpleHTTPServer $port" is almost always "good enough", though the SimpleHTTPServer module contains severe bugs. Secondly, your link right above that snipped to Paul Irish contains an href="" which, obviously, links it to your own page. It makes it seem like you're trying to take credit for his work. This is all sloppy and bad form.
Honestly, anyone who puts code into a blog post without even bothering to RUN IT THEMSELVES first should get out of the business of writing even slightly technical posts. Feel free to review food without tasting it first instead; at least then it's subjective so you can't be wrong. Here, the "/usr/bin/python: No module named SImpleHTTPServer" you'd get if you had arsed yourself to actually check your code to be valid easily clues the reader into your carelessness.
In addition to all that, there's the audacity of posting a post for the "novice" to hacker news when the post is clearly neither relevant for any hacker who has performed any real work or has any real intelligence (they would already know all the mentioned tools) and neither is news for all the tools mentioned are fairly old and well known. You might as well just call us all stupid and dilute the front page further with crap.
I appreciate you taking the time not only to read the post, but to offer your opinion and corrections to my article. I've updated those two mistakes you pointed out.
As I understand it, SimpleHTTPServer offers basic functionality to the user, which is all I use it for...a quick way to view pages using AJAX requests. I attempted to use http.server instead, but as I'm not running Python 3.0 I'm not able to use that option. Since Lion ships with Python 2.7, and many people are using that OS, I felt safe leaving the reference in place.
I do run the server function myself, many times a day in fact, but I made the mistake of typing it in manually rather than copying and pasting from my .zshrc file.
This post isn't intended for hackers, thus the title "...for the novice". The comments I've received about the article thus far, most likely from people not as advanced as yourself, have been positive and appreciative for the information. I'd love to hear some of the tools that improve your workflow daily...would you care to share them?
Honestly, anyone who puts code into a blog post without even bothering to RUN IT THEMSELVES first should get out of the business of writing even slightly technical posts. Feel free to review food without tasting it first instead; at least then it's subjective so you can't be wrong. Here, the "/usr/bin/python: No module named SImpleHTTPServer" you'd get if you had arsed yourself to actually check your code to be valid easily clues the reader into your carelessness.
In addition to all that, there's the audacity of posting a post for the "novice" to hacker news when the post is clearly neither relevant for any hacker who has performed any real work or has any real intelligence (they would already know all the mentioned tools) and neither is news for all the tools mentioned are fairly old and well known. You might as well just call us all stupid and dilute the front page further with crap.