I just came up with a name for the versioning scheme I've been using recently:

Zettelkasten versioning

1, 2, 3, ... 14, 14a, 14b, ... 14z, 14aa, ... 14ak1, 14ak2, ...

Inspiration.

My versions are to communicate identity to users. That's it. Not value, not recency, not stability, not compatibility, not difference, not support status, just identity. Am I using the same version as you?

permalink

It's now easier to build and run little LÖVE apps for yourself on Android

1. Install LÖVE from the app store (see https://love2d.org)
2. Download MiniIDE.love from https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=94852. I've been contributing to this app and vouch for it.

Video preview.

(MiniIDE has also been tested on iOS without limitations. But I gather LÖVE is quite tortuous to install on iOS, so you're on your own there..)

permalink

You can now make any app end-user-programmable -- as long as it's built in LÖVE

Read more on the Malleable Systems Forum.

permalink

"What can we do with what we have ready to hand?" -- Cristóbal Sciutto

permalink

Yesterday was a good day. I built a little app for someone to connect to their R server, plot a dataset based on different dimensions. Pretty trivial, but hopefully easier for them to modify than other similar apps out there.

permalink

Finding Meaning in Christopher Alexander's "The Nature of Order"

by Stefan Lesser

This is the most insightful talk I've watched in recent memory.

Transcript

permalink

Pulling out an old tool to read a long thread on Mastodon.

Not pictured: keyboard shortcuts for structured navigation.

repo

permalink

Fun puzzle:

$ echo "never worn" |sed 's/ /^M/g'
wornr

What is going on here?

permalink

Personal digital infrastructure I've been performing some long overdue computer maintenance activities:

• I've had a server with Linode forever and been very happy. But I recently noticed it would periodically go inaccessible, perhaps after some idleness. Perhaps it had something to do with their acquisition. So I decided to switch providers.
• Back in 2009 when I created my website I built it in Rails (backed by files rather than a database) Last week I replaced all that with raw html, generated with a tiny Lua script. It's nice to be able to unsubscribe from some mailing lists of vulnerability notifications.
• I've been backing up my local laptop to my server, but that was causing me to overflow my disk. Cloud servers are a relatively expensive way to get storage. So I decoupled those concerns and now back up my laptop to rsync.net.

All in all, I'm much happier with my server. It's leaner, runs less stuff, and it'll be easier to move next time. With the way we've been seeing services degrade lately, I think it's useful to be thoughtful about how we cobble together our personal digital infrastructure, architect it to be nimble and easy to move around. If you keep options open you'll be less likely to need to use them.

permalink

After 10+ years on Rails, I've finally gotten around to switching my website to static files.

Hopefully there's no discernable difference from the outside :crossed_fingers:

permalink