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Authors and Engineers who created the future
This is a riff on Ellen Griffen's note on Substack, Why do people keep saying that novelists “predicted” the future? and my response. The gist of it is an attempt to plot (as a multidimensional, interactive plot!) the talents you need to come up with an idea, convince some people that it's interesting and practical for daily life, and then to see it built and actually deployed (often in grotesquely warped form). -
Choosing a CMS (and maybe a new framework)
VS Code and Frontmatter extension work, but are too technical for daily use. This post documents my (eternal) search for something better.
2024
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Comprehensive error handling
Error handling in Rust is "some assembly required" -- error detail is available, and error handling models (early exit, bubble up, ignore) are supported, but there is not a well-accepted and complete convention for handling lower-level errors and bubbling u your own. -
2023
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25 Oct
Shipping (apps in) containers
Triggered by reading this excellent summary, I finally got a clear idea of what a container is, abstracted from the jargon and confusing configuration interfaces that I've dabbled in, especially Docker. Are we in for another platform war?Header Photo by Rinson Chory on Unsplash
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Toward a Producer-friendly Data Marketplace
How to put creators of data in charge of using it. While at same time, retaining the current vibrant market for consumer data.I was reading an article that used the phrase "data and money" , maybe in context of "moving data and money around the internet". But i thought, in these days, data is money, and that's what set me off in this direction. vendors will pay money to websites for access to users. Facebook has capitalized on providing very fine grained information to potential advertisers, and the latter find it valuable and will pay FB a premium. So that's one way data is money. But encryption provides privacy and verification, and everybody is willing to pay (soemthing) for a digital certificate. Another rway. Finally, cryptocurrency, where the data is literally money, not just a valuable commodity.
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Big Reads and Listens
Literature and Music I want to drill into. First, accumulate sources here, then blog about the individual pieces as I wade into them and study them. -
28 Feb
Changing password managers, LastPass to Bitwarden
Converting from LastPass password manager to Bitwarden, or getting started with Bitwarden, there being no time like the present. -
Hacking wakeup for USB and Bluetooth
Getting reliable wakeup from suspend from bluetooth keyboard or USB mouse.Article incomplete; don't know where to put enable to make it sticky across reboot.
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Social Media -- Threat or Menace?
Are Facebook and Twitter a threat to democracy? Threat or Menace? What could or should be done about it?
2021
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Cruising
Thinking about spending more time cruising, and the kind of boat I'd like to have to do that. -
New, new horses
Since we'll be travelling for the forseeable future, I decided to move the blog off the little server and up to Amazon Web Services, where it will be somebody else's problem to keep it running, accessable and online. -
3 Apr
Down the rabbit hole -- blinkenlights
Why, yes, I am building a PDP-11/70 simulation called PiDP11. -
Bluetooth Audio Lag
Ubuntu, for reasons known only to itself, defaults to sub-optimal settings for upscale bluetooth connected speakers, resulting in very noticable audio lag when, e.g, playing John Oliver on YouTube.But the community long ago figured out what's going on and how to fix it.
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Why I Blog
Like everyone else, I've got opinions and experiences to spare and to share. So why not simply haunt the usual online communities and contribute there? Why go to all the trouble of starting an isolated blog? Three reasons: to control my own data; to spare innocent users of all the other sites the burden of my opinions; to see whether this is a feasible model for personal interaction on the internet.
2020
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Wayland on Ubuntu (19.04)
Initially, not seeing many problems, and kudos to the project teams who undoubtedly worked had to bring things to this level. -
29 Jul
New Horses
First, I succumbed to the lure of more screen space. Then, the Ryzen hype from AMD was just irresistible, and I succumbed again. And finally, I've ditched Windows for Linux (ubuntu). But I feel fine about it. -
Wildcard cert via acme.sh
New standard for single-tenant, multi-vdir sites: configure nginx as outer server with paths for each service; run the services as separate vdirs with whatever server they ship with; let nginx terminate the SSL sessions for all of the vdirs and run the service in HTTP. This is easier if you use a single wildcard cert for the domain.
2019
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NGINX supporting multiple services, doing TLS for all
My first direct engagement with Ngnix, employing its vaunted reverse proxy capability. -
30 Oct
