Tag Archives: Tech

Some Z Shell Tricks

Posted on 2021-02-18 by jcs

A lot of Linux people have been singing the praises of Zsh for a long time and even as a Mac user it was always an option but I never bothered. Part of that is that I mostly stay in … Continue reading →

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Paul Graham: What I Worked On

Posted on 2021-02-16 by jcs

By any reckoning, Paul Graham has had a pretty successful life. He’s recognized as an expert on Lisp and has written a couple of books on the subject. In addition to his accomplishments in computer science, he also trained as … Continue reading →

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Sleeping in Unfamiliar Places

Posted on 2021-02-15 by jcs

npr has an interesting article on some recent research about what happens when humans sleep in an unfamiliar place. It’s long been known that humans don’t sleep well in an unfamiliar place. The effect is so common it even has … Continue reading →

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Red Meat Friday: The End of the Story

Posted on 2021-02-12 by jcs

The seemingly never-ending saga of SCO versus Linux may finally have come to an end. SCO’s Darl McBride who spearheaded the effort has declared bankruptsy. If you’re too young to remember those days, it’s hard to comprehend how much the … Continue reading →

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Mouseless

Posted on 2021-02-07 by jcs

If you grew up with computers using a GUI interface, the idea of not using a mouse probably seems ridiculous. Why would anyone want to do that? As I’ve said in other contexts, you can live without air conditioning too … Continue reading →

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A Symbolics and Space Cadet Keyboard

Posted on 2021-01-20 by jcs

If you’re a certain type of geek, especially a certain type of Emacs geek, you likely share a dream with the rest of your tribe: having a Symbolics or a Space Cadet keyboard. I’ve written about that before but now … Continue reading →

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Knuth on Writing

Posted on 2021-01-18 by jcs

Philip Kiely has an interesting interview with Don Knuth that concentrates on the writing aspects of Knuth’s career. Everyone knows about The Art of Computer Programming (AOCP) and TeX but Kiely’s interview drills down on why things are the way … Continue reading →

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Chris Wellons on State Machines

Posted on 2021-01-15 by jcs

As I’ve mentioned a few times, I love programming state machines. I spent many years writing software for communications software using odd protocols. The easiest way of implementing those protocols was almost always to use a state machine. Once you … Continue reading →

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Knuth’s Literate Programming Paper

Posted on 2021-01-14 by jcs

Literate Programming. Back in 1984 when Knuth published his paper proposing Literate Programming, he believed that the concept would take over the programming world. I remember him saying that companies that failed to adopt Literate Programming would soon fall behind … Continue reading →

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Adding a Third Monitor to EXWM

Posted on 2021-01-11 by jcs

Twelve or thirteen years ago, I got my first Mac. Fast forward to today and you’ll find that the Irreal bunker is firmly in the Apple ecosystem. One of the things I don’t miss—at all—is struggling with getting X configured. … Continue reading →

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