Category Archives: General

Securing Your iPhone

Posted on 2019-02-14 by jcs

This is an Apple-centric post but I know a lot of Irreal readers have iPhones or iPads so it’s worth passing on. Over at Computerworld, Jonny Evans has an excellent article on How to stay as private as possible on … Continue reading →

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Sharing Data Among Org-mode Blocks

Posted on 2019-02-13 by jcs

John Kitchin has another excellent post on leveraging Emacs and Org-mode. This time, he considers sharing data between Org-mode code blocks. Most Org-mode users know about naming code blocks and using the results of the computation in another code block … Continue reading →

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Unix and Linux History from Maddog

Posted on 2019-02-12 by jcs

Older readers may know of Jon “Maddog” Hall. Although we hear less from him these days, he’s been a force in the open source movement for many years. I just came across a video in which he talks about Unix … Continue reading →

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NeoTree and Perspectives

Posted on 2019-02-11 by jcs

A lot of people like to organize their workflow around projects, mostly via Bozhidar Batsov’s excellent projectile package. Some of those people go further and use a package like perspective to provide each project with its own workspace. I don’t … Continue reading →

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Org Capture and Refiling

Posted on 2019-02-10 by jcs

Like me, Matus Goljer (fuco1) is a heavy user of Org-capture. I’ve got 11 templates that cover all sorts of events that I want to capture. Goljer has a similar number of templates but his taxonomy is much richer than … Continue reading →

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Using Keyboard Macros to Ease Drudgework

Posted on 2019-02-09 by jcs

I usually use keyboard macros to repeat some editing operation that’s too complicated for iedit, multiple cursors, or search and replace. It’s astounding how useful it can be and every Emacser should learn to use them. Recently, Arne Babenhauserheide tweeted … Continue reading →

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Fighting the Surveillance Economy

Posted on 2019-02-08 by jcs

It’s no secret that we here at Irreal are adamantly opposed to surveillance. That includes the casual monitoring of our communications by the government but especially the hoovering up of our every actions by the malevolent adtech industry. It’s a … Continue reading →

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Calc Tutorial

Posted on 2019-02-07 by jcs

Longtime Irreal readers with good memories will recall that sometime ago I resolved to get better with Emacs Calc. Although I haven’t written much about it, I have been making progress. It’s now my go-to calculator and I’ve learned all … Continue reading →

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Run Your Life With Emacs

Posted on 2019-02-06 by jcs

Over at the Keyhole Development Blog, Garrett Hopper explains why he runs his life with Emacs. Like many of us, he hates having to switch context when he changes the application he’s using. Each application has its own key bindings … Continue reading →

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Just in Case You Still Thought “Google Is Your Friend”

Posted on 2019-02-05 by jcs

Many years ago, when someone would ask some easily discoverable question, I would respond with “Google is your friend.” I haven’t said that for a long time now because Google most emphatically is not your friend. If you think that’s … Continue reading →

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