Articles
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The Joys of the Command Line
April 8, 2009
I’ve found myself sliding back towards command-line interfaces (CLI) lately… it’s been more of a slow drift than a sudden shift, and I haven’t really given it much thought. It’s not like I’m late to the party, exactly – I started out on the command line, and now I’m coming full circle, or at least partially so.
I find I’m much more efficient when I can interact entirely through the keyboard – yes, one must use a pointing device for some kinds of tasks (and I love my Space Navigator for flying around Google Earth) but most of my time these days is spent reading and writing, in a bunch of different applications (list to follow) with little need for mousing if the interfaces are good. I do make an effort to learn keyboard shortcuts, and for the apps I use a lot that has definitely paid off.
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Fighting with FTP
April 8, 2009
Read moreSome things should just be easier than they are…
Anna has a bunch of GigaPan images she created, and wants to get them to the museum to be printed out giganto-size for the upcoming open house. Well, GigaPans are aptly named – each one is 2-3GB in size! Putting ‘em on a flash drive just isn’t practical; only a couple will fit on a DVD; and I didn’t have an extra USB hard drive ready to go.
No problem, I thought – my nifty new network attached storage (NAS) has a FTP server built in to it! I can just fire that up, and we’ll be off to the races. Yeah, right.
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Yay, Me!
March 12, 2009
Woo hoo, I got the first, and right, answer to Cyclelicious’ inaugural Tuesday Transit Quiz!
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Bicycle Bumper Stickers
March 10, 2009
If bikes had bumpers on which to stick things, I would plaster mine with some of the following phrases, inspired by innumerable micro-moments I’ve experienced while commuting back and forth to work. The sub-title to this could be “Retorts to the (mostly unsaid) thoughts of car-drivers, as implied by their driving and/or emotive glares from behind the windshield.”
1) “Thanks, but I do own a car; I choose to bike instead.”
2) “I sure hope you weren’t planning to apply for a job from me (yes, I’m hiring!)”
3) “Why no, I do not believe your [penis|breasts] appear larger when you [insert sophomoric car-driving action here].”
4) “Yes, thanks, I do like to think I own the road (at least the tiny piece I’m occupying, over here on the edge of it.)”
5) “I’m sorry, I didn’t notice that your [Hummer|Porsche|BMW|PoS] is secretly an [emergency vehicle|tank|starship|jet fighter].”
6) “So exactly what part of my six blinking lights, bright yellow vest, and innumerable reflectors did you not see?”
Feel free to tack “you selfish pork-face” on the end of any of these!
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Bicycle Culture Wars
March 8, 2009
Read moreSome interesting intersections of life and commentary lately:
Last week, whilst on a ride with Randy and Mike, we stopped for coffee in Boulder Creek, charming little hamlet in the Santa Cruz mountains. A fellow stopped by and asked if we rode on the local 2-lane road (the only one that goes through Boulder Creek) and then launched into an unprompted diatribe about how cyclists didn’t belong on the road, as they got in his way and slowed him down.