Author Archives: jcs

Magit Stage All Changes

Posted on 2013-10-15 by jcs

As I’ve mentioned previously, I keep my blog posts—all my work, really—in a git repository. I manage the repositories with magit. If you aren’t a magit user, you’re really missing out and should take a look. When I publish a … Continue reading →

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Using yasnippet to Reduce Blogging Friction

Posted on 2013-10-14 by jcs

Every Irreal blog post begins with some header information that tells org2blog the title, category, and tags for the post. These get communicated to WordPress when org2blog exports the post. Those lines look like this: #+TITLE: Using =yasnippet= to Reduce … Continue reading →

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Air Gaps

Posted on 2013-10-13 by jcs

Bruce Schneier has an interesting post on setting up an air gap computer. It seems simple: just never connect your computer to the Internet. The problem is a completely isolated computer isn’t much use unless all you want to do … Continue reading →

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The Lavabit Story

Posted on 2013-10-12 by jcs

The New Yorker has a nice article on the Lavabit back story and current status. It recounts the details of the negotiations between Lavabit and the government. It’s pretty clear that the government was disingenuous about their demands. Armed with … Continue reading →

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Terror of the Demo

Posted on 2013-10-11 by jcs

I’ve given my fair share of demos as I’m sure many of you have. If you’re anything like me, you were lucky if the worst thing you suffered was butterflies in your stomach. But all that was nothing compared to … Continue reading →

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Emacs Rocks Does WebRebels

Posted on 2013-10-10 by jcs

I’ve been eagerly awaiting the posting of Magnar Sveen’s WebRebels video. It’s finally up but sadly the projection of his computer screen is unreadable even when blown up to full screen. That’s a great disappointment. Of course, Sveen knows a … Continue reading →

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A Nice Example of Interactive Programming

Posted on 2013-10-09 by jcs

I’ve written previously about interactive or exploratory coding. It’s the sort of thing that Emacs and Emacs Lisp make easy and attractive. You sort of feel your way along writing little snippets of code and then stitch them together into … Continue reading →

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More Password Advice

Posted on 2013-10-08 by jcs

Stavros Korokithakis has a nice post on choosing and securing passwords. Although his recommendations won’t come as news to Irreal readers, the post is still worthwhile because he explains the reasons behind his recommendations. Even more useful—especially for your Aunt … Continue reading →

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Emacs Work Flow

Posted on 2013-10-07 by jcs

Michael Wall has a nice post on his Emacs workflow. I found it interesting for two reasons. First, I always enjoy seeing how others solve the problems that we, as developers and Emacs users, all face. Most often, I learn … Continue reading →

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Password Contains Invalid Characters

Posted on 2013-10-06 by jcs

Nick Selby tweets a pro tip: what to do if your site delivers the error message “Password contains invalid characters”. It’s funny, of course, but like most things we find funny, it contains the germ of truth. Now, can we … Continue reading →

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