Tag Archives: Tech

Nikhil Marathe has an interesting post on what he calls “Mystery Knowledge.” By Mystery Knowledge he means knowledge that you aren’t apt to discover on your own but that is easy to learn once it’s been pointed out and, when … Continue reading →

Here’s a mystery to entertain you as you segue into the weekend. Jerror was complaining on the Emacs subredit that their university had blocked MELPA. What?!? Why in the world would anyone block MELPA? It doesn’t appear to be one … Continue reading →

Longtime readers know that Irreal is, um, skeptical of most studies put out by the psychology community. They are, largely, not reproducible and often just silly. One finding that is popular among psychologists that that note-taking is more effective when … Continue reading →

This being a leap year means that Programmers Day comes a day early. As a cal -j will tell you, today is, in fact, the 256th day of the year. So happy Programmers Day to all you Irreal readers who … Continue reading →

Old-time Irrealers and alert newcomers know that I’m a big fan of Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels. Indeed, this blog is named after one of his ideas from the novel Excession: the Irreal. I mention Banks because I was reading … Continue reading →

The Verge has a story that is at once hilarious, infuriating, and deeply disturbing. In this time of COVID-19 much education has moved online. Except for scale, this isn’t really new. It’s been possible for many years for children to … Continue reading →

Apologies to those of you who aren’t members of the cult but this is another post on Apple products. For the last year or so I’ve been using a wireless charger for my iPhone. I like it because it’s easy … Continue reading →

One of my favorite development strategies is using finite state machines. They’re not right for every type of problem but they have greater applicability than you might think. I’ve written several FSM-based applications almost always in C. C isn’t the … Continue reading →

A surprising number of people hate Amazon. I say “surprising” because I don’t understand their animus. Sure, they send us a huge amount of what amounts to spam, have an unfriendly attitude towards organized labor—at least as concerns their own … Continue reading →

If you’re a developer, Steve Yegge has some advice: learn to type. Yegge’s posts are always amusing and instructive so if you haven’t already seen his rant on developers who don’t touch type, be sure to take a look. But, … Continue reading →