Technology

Unix as a tool forge

7 Nov 2022
Programming, Technology, Emacs

Wikipedia1 cites a few different sources on what "Unix Philosophy" is. Peter Salus summarizes it as: Write programs that do one thing and do it well. Write programs to work together. Write programs to handle text streams, because that is a universal interface. That second bullet point is my favorite: making composable programs rather than monolithic systems. In this way, Unix is designed to be a forge for easily building new tools. ...

Book Review: Technopoly

26 Aug 2020
Book-Review, Technology, Philosophy

In Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, Neil Postman argues that our infatuation with technology has insidiously eroded our culture. We gain much through technology, but it comes at a price; all too often we are blind to that price. This book seeks to call attention to the costs of a technology-focused society. I felt this poignantly because I, as a technology worker, know what that infatuation feels like.

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DuckDuckGo

15 Jan 2019
Technology, Tools

DuckDuckGo is a search engine. Like Google Search, you just throw some keywords into a box and get a list of results. Lots of people use Google, but I don’t. DuckDuckGo works better for me, and this is why. The Duck ## Consistent Results Did you know that Google will give you different search results, based on who you are and what you have searched for in the past? This is called a filter bubble, and it’s annoying and dangerous. ...

Life Hacks: Text Notifications

11 Aug 2018
Technology

Life Hacks: Text Notifications # So many notifications come to us in the form of an audible alert, and this can sometimes be inconvenient. Who likes having their phone go off in church? The problem is that sound propagates regardless of the intended target. Touch, on the other hand, is an inherently personal sensation. Setting your phone to vibrate lets you know you’re being alerted, without notifying everyone else in the room as well. ...

Leaving Facebook

23 Jun 2018
Technology

Deutsche Übersetzung folgt. I’ve left* Facebook. There’s an asterisk there. I’m not going to delete my account, but I’m no longer checking Facebook more than once or twice a month, if that. I’m not trying to be a recluse—below are a few ways to contact me that I do check far more often than Facebook. I want to be your friend, but I’d rather that friendship be through a real connection rather than some online “status”. ...

Eh, Docker, we have a problem here…

26 Oct 2017
Technology

Quick note for those who don’t know about Docker: Docker is a program that lets me take packaged-up programs (called images or containers) and run them without having to worry much about dependencies. Today I decided to upgrade my version of Ghost Blog. I’m using the Docker image on a Digital Ocean droplet. Updating should be simple, I thought. I would take down the blog then spin it back up again after pulling down the latest Docker image. ...

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