Category Archives: General

The New Yorker and GNU

Posted on 2015-03-21 by jcs

The New Yorker is celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of the GNU manifesto with a nice article on RMS and his work on Free Software. All-in-all it’s a pretty good article considering that it’s appearing in a non-technical venue. They get … Continue reading →

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Yet Another Reason…

Posted on 2015-03-20 by jcs

… I’ve got to learn calc: Emacs Calc has probability distribution functions (ltp, utp), but alas no inverses. https://t.co/eiIArll7pL Still, pretty impressive. #emacs — Barton Yadlowski (@bmorphism) February 28, 2015 I keep finding more reasons I should spend some time on … Continue reading →

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JS;DR

Posted on 2015-03-19 by jcs

An idea whose time has come. I have nothing against using Javascript to provide enhanced navigation and things like menus but if the site won’t render without it, there’s a problem.

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Tips on Everyday Emacs Use

Posted on 2015-03-19 by jcs

Daniel Ehrman has a nice post on 11 tips for solving everyday editing problems with Emacs. The list is a must-read for Emacs n00bs but even experienced Emacsers might benefit by being reminded of a few of the tips. I … Continue reading →

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Literate DevOps

Posted on 2015-03-18 by jcs

As regular readers know, I’m a big fan of reproducible research. It makes it possible for anyone—even yourself—to reproduce all the steps of your research exactly as you performed it. A related concept, termed Literate DevOps by Howard Abrams, does … Continue reading →

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An Apropos Hydra

Posted on 2015-03-17 by jcs

Abo-abo is still blogging up a storm. I haven’t commented on every post because if I did I wouldn’t have time for writing about anything else. His latest post is about a hydra for apropos. My first reaction was, “Meh, … Continue reading →

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The Difference Between Malware and Adware

Posted on 2015-03-16 by jcs

Infosec Taylor Swift has a clarification for Lenovo, other computer manufacturers, and the journalists who report on them: Journalists: "Adware" is malware with a legal team. — InfoSec Taylor Swift (@SwiftOnSecurity) February 19, 2015

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Editing Files as Root

Posted on 2015-03-16 by jcs

How many times have you brought up a file to edit and discovered that you don’t have write permissions? Usually they’re system files but sometimes you’re tying to help a colleague and don’t have the proper permissions. You can always … Continue reading →

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And Make the Coffee

Posted on 2015-03-15 by jcs

So much more than a Swiss Army Knife: How to end any #vi <-> #emacs discussion; Emacs can make coffee http://t.co/xDfQyeuaUV — Joerg Rings (@JoergR) February 13, 2015

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The CIA and Apple

Posted on 2015-03-15 by jcs

Just when you thought it couldn’t get much worse, The//Intercept is reporting that the CIA has been conducting a sustained multi-year effort to exploit Apple’s iPhone and iPad. The idea was to defeat Apple’s efforts to provide their users with … Continue reading →

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