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+#+TITLE: onec
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+#+TODO: IDEA(i) DRAFT(d) | PUBLISHED(p)
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+#+hugo_base_dir: ./.export/hugo/onec.me/
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+#+hugo_section: ./post
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+
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+* Life :@life:
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+** PUBLISHED Campaigning
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+CLOSED: [2017-10-27]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: campaigning
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+:END:
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+
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+Campaigning has been a very interesting trip. The most memoroable aspect of
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+running for select board so far has been finding people standing up along side
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+me and asking how they can help me gain a seat at the table. Mostly, that's
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+because I tend to think of myself as a relatively unimportant person. And I am,
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+even now. Yet my desire to serve the town intersects with a lot of other folks'
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+desires for their town, and I'm amazed that they see me as someone who can help
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+them.
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+
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+Mostly, what that means to me is that this has become a responsibility. Not that
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+I didn't already know that to a certain degree, but extent to which service is
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+really responsiblity has fully dawned on me now.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Coaching soccer
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-26]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: coaching-soccer
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+:END:
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+
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+This is my second year coaching the middle school soccer team here in Castine.
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+Each year I am filled with apprehension about the make up of the team, and
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+wether coaching is actually something I can do. All those kids, just looking at
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+you to say something, anything really, so long as it relates to soccer.
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+
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+And yet here I am. My second year of telling kids what to do. Interestingly,
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+what's most stood out from year to year is the growth of the players. Fifth
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+graders last year who had trouble paying attention and looked at me like I was
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+speaking Greek when I told them to hustle to the ball, have become easily
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+motivated. Older players seem almost excited to step into leadership roles,
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+whether in the goal or taking a midfield position with lots of running.
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+
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+Really, it's the same as watching my own kids grow up. The miracle of humanity
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+is how we grow and develop our own personality quirks and motivations which are
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+at once totally our own, and also clearly cobbled together by experiences we've
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+shared. For my part, I love it.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Leadership
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+CLOSED: [2017-07-26]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: leadership
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+:END:
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+
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+An interesting discussion occurred at work today where I was forced to put into
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+words some thoughts I've been kicking around for a while on the nature of
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+leadership. None of my thoughts are original, mind you. This one was cribbed
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+from a blog post about leading without authority. I'll drop the link when I find
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+it. The long and the short of that post was that leadership has only the loosest
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+relationship with authority. In fact, it's often a sign of dysfunctional
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+leadership which depends on having someone give you authority.
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+
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+In the world of power, authority is one of the most difficult types to wield,
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+because it generally means someone has placed an expectation on you. You will be
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+forced to live up to those expectations or be cut down from your place of
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+authority quickly. Meanwhile, leadership is not actually a type of power, but a
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+behavior. This alone should be mind-blowing if you're actually following along
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+at home.
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+
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+You can lead without authority. You can lead with authority. You can actually
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+lead without saying a thing. This is key tenant in modern stoicism, actually.
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+Don't tell, do. And so it is in leadership as well. Don't tell people what to
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+do, show them what is effective, and empathize with their plight.
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+
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+One of the more disappointing interactions I had recently was when a co-worker
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+expressed a lack of joy in his work. It struck a nerve with me, in that I had
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+felt many of the same things. And our lead engineer, who tends to lead through
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+authority rather than trust, kind, sort of, well ... blew us off. I really
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+didn't see that coming, and it's forced me to take a step back and realize that
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+I need to do a better job of leading without authority. Of building trust
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+amongst my co-workers so that when the need arises, I can step up.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Off days
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-23]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: off-days
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+:END:
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+
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+We're all entitled to having off days, but it doesn't make them any easier to
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+work around. I woke up today without much ambition, despite the fact that we
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+have chickens that need to be slaughtered. To add insult to injury, after we
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+decided not to worry about slaughter, I went downstairs to discover that the
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+toilet is not filling. There's simply no water in the supply line. To make
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+things weirder, the sink that's on the same line works fine. We've been working
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+thorugh issues with sediment in our well water, and it seems like this is
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+probably related. But we really have no idea.
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+
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+Yesterday was a funny day too where matters beyond my control led to me not
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+being very responsive at work. That carries it's own stress as deadlines loom
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+and people expect a certain result and you have to explain why the result is not
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+there yet. Effectively, today is a day where the rug feels slightly frayed
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+around the edges. Life is hardly falling apart, but things are just starting to
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+slip a little bit.
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+
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+We're all entitled to days like these, but it doesn't make it any easier to
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+weather, especially when working on remainig stoic about life, it can feel like
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+a setback. That said, the feeling of discouragment is really pride. Pride that
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+you thought you had things under control, when in reality you were never in
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+control of the things around you, but simply your respones to the things around
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+you. Centering in these moments involves acknowledging that all you can do is
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+control your response and actions, and doing your best to return to those
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+
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+** PUBLISHED On the ballot
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-18]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: on-the-ballot
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+:END:
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+
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+I'm officially going to be on the ballot in Castine for selectmen this year!
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+
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+Turned in my nomination papers, and, pending a review of the voter signature, I
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+will be on the ballot along with Patrick Haugen and Buzz Layton. It was a lot
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+of fun talking to folks about the town while collecting signature, and I'm
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+feeling really blessed to be in a community that not only provides me the
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+opportunity to run for public office, but one where my friends and neighbors
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+are actively enthuiastic about my campaign.
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+
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+Next stop, election day!
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Monarchs
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-16]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: monarchs
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+:END:
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+
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+I knew that monarch butterflies were born somewhere in the north and then
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+migrated to Mexico for the winter. But today on a hike on Sears Island we got to
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+see a field of wildflowers, predominently milkweed, that was set aside
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+specifically for monarchs to develop in.
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+
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+Indeed, we saw a few monarch caterpillers, which interesting actually share a
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+color pattern with their flying form.
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+
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+Our enthusiasm was dampened slightly when the flying insects came out. They
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+specifically seemed to want our lunch and recent traumatic events involving
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+ground hornets meant we had to make a hasty retreat.
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+
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+The hike ended up being almost two miles and was through some really pretty
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+paths. I would definitely enjoy hiking on Sears Island again.
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+
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+* Self-hosting :@selfhosting
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+** DRAFT Self-hosted weather stations
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: self-hosted-weather-stations
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+:END:
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+
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+For a few years now, I've had a cobbled together weather station using Ecowitt
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+sensors that one can readily buy on Amazon, and the fantastic open source tool
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+`WeeWx`. I really don't think I can sign the praises of WeeWx loudly enough.
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+
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+The components of the setup:
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+
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++ Ecowitt GW3000 "gateway"
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++ Ecowitt XXXX temperature sensor
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++ Ecowitt rain guage
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++ Ecowitt anemometer
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++ FreeBSD jail (or any unix-like 24-7 server, an RPi would be fine here)
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+
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+Ecowitt is better know in the agricultural community for making very expensive,
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+very high performing sensors for farms. But thankfully they've dipped their toes
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+in the commercial waters and provided a highly cost-effective way to build a
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+home weather station cluster, without dropping hundreds of dollars on a Davis
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+instrument (and then being locked into their ecosystem).
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+
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+See, the real beauty of Ecowitt is that all the sensor communicate with the
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+gateway over a 900Mhz channel which the GW listens for, parses and then
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+transmits to a given IP address on the local network. The recipient of the
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+gateway's communication is supposed to be a super janky phone app. But we can do
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+one better and send it all to WeeWx!
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+
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+WeeWx handles a lot of different sensors. So you could probably replace
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+everything I just said above with plugging in a $300 Davis weather station and
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+use that with WeeWx. But your mileage will vary depending on model numbers and
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+firmware and honestly, nobody got time for that. Instead, we'll use the Ecowitt
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+plugin in WeeWx to intercept the gateway's messages, store them in a sqlite
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+database and let WeeWx generate a really nice HTML page for our weather station
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+(demo of mine here: https://wx.unbl.ink).
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+
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+Of course, now all that fine weather data is parsed and stuffed ina SQL data
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+store, so you can also re-process it to a heavier weight DB engine, like
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+postgres and go nuts. At least, that's what I've done. Having raw, time-based
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+data from sensors on your own property gives you a chance to run historical
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+calculations of specific events, and it also allows me to pull local data into
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+other projects, so my run tracker doesn't get data from the airport 90 miles
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+from my house, but can use super local weather data.
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+
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+* Thoughts :@thoughts:
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+** PUBLISHED Why are we grateful? :gratefulness:
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-19]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: why-are-we-grateful
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+:END:
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+
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+I just finished the book *The Righteous Mind* by Jonathan Haidt and was struck
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+by a line at the beginning of his acknowledgment section. Relaying what a
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+graduate student once taught him he explains that we do not express gratitude to
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+settle debts or sow the ground for favors. We give our gratitude out to make
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+stronger relationships.
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+
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+I was struck by what a simple, yet profound thought that was. Gratefulness is
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+not a selfish tool we wield to get the upper hand. Humans, while highly
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+rational about a great many things, operate more like bees in a hive than most
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+would give us credit for. Hives need cohesion. Strong relationships breed
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+cohesion. The process is so clear.
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+
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+Do you imagine that chimps can express their gratitude to one another?
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Are you like me? :uu:
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-20]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: are-you-like-me
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+:END:
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+
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+One of the aspects of my faith that I have the most difficulty with is accepting
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+other people regardless of where they are. As a human, I like to hang with
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+people like me. This is understandable, as tribalism exists in the world as an
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+artifact of the world we have lived in for the last 10,000 years.
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+
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+And yet, UUism calls me to be accepting of others and to encourage others in
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+their spiritual growth. How can I be tribal and accepting of others at the same
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+time? I think a big part of that practice is being honest with yourself about
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+the biases you may have. I value thoughtfulness and intelligence highly. I do
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+not place as much value on art and entertainment. It is not that I don't like
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+those things, but someone who orients their life around art make it immediately
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+more difficult for me to find similarities and to enjoy their company.
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+
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+The best thing I've found in these situations is to keep plumbing for
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+commonality. As awkward as tribalism can be, it's also a fantastic tool to build
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+affinity for other people. If you can intentionally try to build a tribe with
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+strangers, before you know it they are no longer a stranger and instead part of
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+a new tribe that you just created. Maybe they have kids. I have kids and know
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+that world all too well. Perhaps they have a Mormon grandmother who is difficult
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+to be around :) Yet another opportunity to build the community that was missing
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+before.
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+
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+The trick is not to disavow the aspects of our human psychology that make us
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+able to accept others, but use them to our advantage to grow our tribe larger,
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+or at least increase the number of small tribes we're a part of.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Finding meaning
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-27]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: finding-meaing
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+:END:
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+
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+What does it mean to encourage others towards spiritual growth? At a recent
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+board meeting, which included a fairly contentious issue, a number of friends
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+and myself certainly did not encourage anyone towards spiritual growth. The root
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+of the problem, as with many problems, lies with differences; differences of
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+opinion, experience, and expectations. As a Unitarian Universalist congregation,
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+we espouse the seven principles, which are as close to dogma as you're likely to
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+see in UUism. One of these seven "pillars" of behavior as a UU calls us to
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+accept others and help them towards spiritual growth. How can we do that when
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+we're so different?
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+
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+I'm repeating myself here, but repetition is the best way to learn anything, so
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+let's go again. Difference tends to cause us to build walls. Often we do not do
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+so intentionally, but humans are animals, and there is a base tribalness to much
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+of what animals do. It should not surprise us that we like to be with our own
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+kind, to have our ideas reinforced, to spend time with those we've shared
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+experiences. But that gets to the crux of it. Share experiences with other
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+people. Embrace our tribalness to create connections with people who are
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+currently strangers. This is not radical acceptance. If you believe that
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+abortion is a sin against your chosen diety, that is not a good place to begin
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+acceptance. Rather, why not talk about youre experience with your children? Talk
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+about sports, the weather, and begin to ask questions.
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+
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+Do you know where the members on your board were born? Where they were raised?
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+What they personally believe? The stand out experiences in their lives? Their
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+favorite books? Movies? What they love? What drives them crazy? These are not
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+retorical questions. Nor are they questions that I have asked yet. So no need to
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+feel bad. Being an accepting and welcoming human being is difficult preciscely
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+because of our earlier manifestation as uncooperative animals. But by some
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+miracle have developed the skills of discernment and cooperation, and we should
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+perform social exercises to keep our open-ness well conditioned.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Free and Responsible :religion:uu:
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+CLOSED: [2017-09-28]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: free-and-responsible
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+:END:
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+
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+The way I was raised, certain people were simply wrong. If they didn't share the
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+same enthusiasm for science, they were incorrect. If they believed in a
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+benevolent (or even malevolent) Christian god, they were wrong. There was very
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+little gray in many of the positions that were espoused to me. One of the great
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+aspects of humanity is that we are given the opportunity to raise our children
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+with our values and beliefs. But, of course, there are responsibilities there
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+too.
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+
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+It almost seems absurd to say this, but I don't think I was always responsibly
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+educated. Absurd, because that's a high bar and I'm not sure anyone can ever
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+claim to have been educated under the perfect paradigm. But to the extent that
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+it took me many years to understand what it means to pursue a free and
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+responsible search for truth and meaning, I think there could have been more
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+openess to what I was exposed to. The Christian Bible is an amazing book. The
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+Bhagavad Gita is absolutely beautiful. Darwin had his doubts about the extent to
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+which evolution allows us to understand life. Newton was downright crazy half
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+the time.
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+
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+The source of responsibility in our lives is humbleness. When we say we are
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+responsible for our children, that does not mean if we fail to teach them the
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+right things we have failed. It means if we fail to listen to them, and discern
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+what they need based on what we understand about them and what they tell us, we
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+have failed them. There is no test for responsible parenthood, just as there is
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+no test of responsible searching for meaning in our lives. When we have the
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+freedom to search for truth and meaning, we must use discernment and listening
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+as our foundation for responsibility. Listen first, think second, act last.
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+
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+** PUBLISHED Intentions :intention:
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+CLOSED: [2018-08-19]
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+:PROPERTIES:
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+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: intentions
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+:END:
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+
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+The idea here, cribbed from Bryan Cantrill's talk on oral traditions in software
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+development, is the importance of making as clear as possible your intentions
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+when you do things. Often I feel as though intention gets a bad rap. The road to
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+hell, and what-not. But the reality is that, if you are doing something, it is
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+best to do it with intention. God help us the things we do impulsively or
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+emotionally. Sometimes they work out alright, but it's usually best to go back
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+and see if we can learn why it happened. That's still applicable when doing
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+things intentionally, but because there was forethought, we are already a step
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+ahead.
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+
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+Of course, what this really means is that we also need to make sure we document
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+our intentions. This is where we come back to Bryan's talk. It's not enough to
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+solve a problem, or build a product. You have to document the process that got
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+you there. In software, you leave your intentions via comments, documentation,
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+blog posts, podcasts, talks, or just conversations with co-workers and friends.
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+But one way or another, you should document what you set out to do and whether
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+you accomplished it. In the absence of this, we are really just throwing darts.
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+I'd wager dollars to donuts that few significant works were created by throwing
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+darts.
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+
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+I'm currently reading the book /Sing, Unburied, Sing/ by Jesymn Ward. The most
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+disturbing aspect of one of the characters in Ward's brilliant story is the
|
|
|
+complete lack of intention in her actions. Her internal governor appears to be
|
|
|
+fueled entirely by impulse and emotion, leaving those around her hurt, confused,
|
|
|
+angry and afraid. When humans act without intention, the results tend to appear
|
|
|
+brutally selfish, even if the underlying logic is not. When we impulsively shoot
|
|
|
+off an email, we have, by definition, not given it any thought. The
|
|
|
+repercussions of such an action are hard to understand.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Thus, while the road to hell may indeed be paved with good intentions, it's
|
|
|
+probably better than the road that's paved with impulsive and emotional
|
|
|
+outbursts.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Running Tired :running:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-08-20]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: running-tired
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+After an angsty 25+ years of my life, I've come around to love running. This is
|
|
|
+obvious to anyone who knows me. I discovered it as a great hobby when you live
|
|
|
+in a rural area and can't get together on a regular basis to play sports.
|
|
|
+Combined with the ability to track running with technology, it has become a
|
|
|
+hobby that at this point I would even if I couldn't track, or had access to
|
|
|
+regular sports events. I just love being out on the road, listening to nature
|
|
|
+(or music) and feeling the air and precipitation.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+But that's not what this is about. This post is about when I'm less than joyful
|
|
|
+on a run. A big part of running is making it a habit so that it isn't a
|
|
|
+struggle. The hope is that you can condition yourself to be able to use
|
|
|
+relatively little effort to get out there. That's the goal. Of course, reality
|
|
|
+being what it is, running it not always effortless.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The last few weeks I've changed my diet and had an explosion of personal and
|
|
|
+professional commitments. The changes in routine have led to runs that have been
|
|
|
+crammed in my schedule sideways and at times that are not my favorite. Which
|
|
|
+ultimately has led to runs that would normally be close to effortless, requiring
|
|
|
+more effort. But there's an opportunity here too. The opportunity is to toughten
|
|
|
+my mental state to run while under effort. Even when things don't go right, we
|
|
|
+have to practice a combination of mindfulness and grounding in your ability to
|
|
|
+push through, while still listening to your body and not pushing too hard.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Nethack
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-01-13 Sun 22:45]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: nethack
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I discovered Nethack for the first time this weekend. Well, I knew it existed
|
|
|
+for a while, but I had always sort of poked around at it, generally unimpressed.
|
|
|
+But on Friday there was a lobste.rs post about a speedrun of nethack that
|
|
|
+totally captured my attention. The runners used the inventory at the start of a
|
|
|
+randomly generated map to determine which seed was used by the RNG to build the
|
|
|
+dungeon. From there, they had a general sense of what would work. This resulted
|
|
|
+in an ascension, as victories are called, of sub 8 minutes. The previous best on
|
|
|
+the most popular nethack server, nethack.alt.org, was more than 90 minutes.
|
|
|
+Crazy.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+All that to say that reading about their speedrun made me realized how much more
|
|
|
+there was in nethack. Much more. And now I'm hooked. I also joined the IRC
|
|
|
+channel for NAO and with IRCCloud I get notifications when I'm done with a game
|
|
|
+with my final score. It's actually kind of delightful. Now I need to stop
|
|
|
+wasting time with it :)
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Trompe l'oeil :empathy:running:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-05-24 Fri 15:16]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: trompe-l-oeil
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+When running, you will sometimes come to a path that, for whatever reason, is
|
|
|
+difficult to read. While the incline may go up, your eye and, subsequently
|
|
|
+your mind, says it's going down. Such visual tricks are called trompe
|
|
|
+l'oeils, literally "trick of the eye" in French.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Personally, these tricks often have the effect of letting me run harder
|
|
|
+uphill than I otherwise would, revealing the incredible amount of mental
|
|
|
+power that goes into distance running. If my mind does not believe I'm going
|
|
|
+uphill, I run faster, even if I am in fact going uphill. Most people would
|
|
|
+consider this a cool trick to get you to run faster. Unless you didn't want
|
|
|
+to run faster.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+In a race, such tricks would be welcome. I am going all-out, pushing myself
|
|
|
+to the limit to achieve a personal record, or, in rare cases, to actually win
|
|
|
+the race outright. But in training, such exertions are often unwelcome.
|
|
|
+Outside of races, pushing yourself as hard as you can go is generally frowned
|
|
|
+upon. There is no use destroying your capacity to run tomorrow with a hard
|
|
|
+training run today. Training theory says you should lay down a base of solid,
|
|
|
+slower running, and save faster, max-heartrate runs for the occasional
|
|
|
+intense workout.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This, it occurs to me, is a perfect analogy for how we use our ability to
|
|
|
+reason, and to conversely to simply react. Danny Kahneman would have called
|
|
|
+this fast thinking and slow thinking. You would expect that in most cases,
|
|
|
+having a "gut feeling" about something would be great. But in practice, such
|
|
|
+impulsive decision making often gets us into trouble. Our slow thinking --
|
|
|
+our ability to reason -- ought to be a our base, slow training thinking. This
|
|
|
+sort of thinking prepares us for moments where we need our fast thinking, or
|
|
|
+our reactionary thought.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This has sweeping implications for all sorts of personal interactions. I'm
|
|
|
+quite interested in how this plays into Nate Walker's ideas of "moral
|
|
|
+imagination" and radical empathy. You see, most of us are actually not every
|
|
|
+good at empathyzing. Sympathy comes naturally to a great many people. We can
|
|
|
+imagine the pain, or anger someone is feeling when we are in the presence of
|
|
|
+it. But empathy asks us not just to feel someone's emotional state, but to
|
|
|
+understand them.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The problem, as I see it, is that, like with running, there are trompe
|
|
|
+l'oeils all around us. Places where we think we understand why someone is
|
|
|
+acting the way they are.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+"She's just pissed because I forgot to call last night."
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+"He's still frustrated because he didn't have time to get coffee this morning"
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+On the face of it, those very well might be true. Or they might not. When do
|
|
|
+we know we're running hard up hill? In most places in life, this is
|
|
|
+completely unimportant to quickly address someone's emotional state. Far more
|
|
|
+important is to be patient, and understanding without necessarily assuming
|
|
|
+that we /can know right now/ what's bothering someone, or why they're doing
|
|
|
+what they're doing.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+"She struggles with abandonment issues since her father left when she was 8,
|
|
|
+and while you didn't call, what upset her most was feeling alone."
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+"He was up really late last night stressing about work that was supposed to
|
|
|
+be done. Not getting cofffee made things worse, but were hardly what cause
|
|
|
+his foul mood."
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+In both of these cases, there are underlying mental states. It requires
|
|
|
+imagination and trust in our fellow humans to truly empathize in these
|
|
|
+circumstances. While the road appeared to go down hill, and we were all into
|
|
|
+bombing down it, the reality is that we burned ourselves out on a training
|
|
|
+run that tricked us into going up hill. We would have been better served to
|
|
|
+hold our judgment for a little longer, and asked more questions, and listened
|
|
|
+more closely. Rarely do we need to exercise empathy quickly, and applying
|
|
|
+Walker's "moral imagination" can get us a lot closer to understanding a lot
|
|
|
+more people, and making all our lives a lot easier.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Equity :uu:christianity:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2017-09-19 Fri 15:16]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: equity
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The gospel of Matthew suggests that Christ's heaven is an equal opportunity
|
|
|
+saver. That is, it is not a place where those who worked the hardest receive the
|
|
|
+best, or those who took and never gave suffer. The parable of the vineyard
|
|
|
+laborers more or less spells out a universal salvation message for those who
|
|
|
+would be willing to work, not for how much they work. And, as a parable, that
|
|
|
+means that those who come to find love and compassion late in life are no less
|
|
|
+entitled to salvation than anyone else.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+In Unitarian Universalism, this reflects very accurately what we mean in our
|
|
|
+second principle. We affirm justice, equity and compassion in human relations.
|
|
|
+Note, carefully, that we do not include equality in what we affirm. Equality is
|
|
|
+a difficult concept for humans to hold in their minds, because it suggests that
|
|
|
+everyone needs the same thing. Instead, let us focus our energy on providing
|
|
|
+justice and equity. Because the abused child may need more love and patient
|
|
|
+understanding than the child raised in a loving home. The diversity and color of
|
|
|
+conditions that humans live in exclude the possibility of anything ever being
|
|
|
+equal when it comes to love.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Instead let us strive for equity and considered justice, ensuring that needs are
|
|
|
+being met and that we are working towards making everyone whole. Indeed,
|
|
|
+laborers who did not have the advantage of being there at the start of the day
|
|
|
+deserve their full payment all the same.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Imagining yourself doing :running:habits:bestself:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-11-26 Tue 11:06]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: imagining-yourself-doing
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+When people say "I can't do that" most of the time, they're actually saying "I
|
|
|
+can't see myself doing that." When I started running, a lot of people said they
|
|
|
+didn't know how I could run so far, or that they could never do that.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+When I started, I didn't imagine I'd run marathons. I just started with 1 or 2
|
|
|
+mile runs. Those 2-mile runs were hard, and sometimes they still are.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Yet being out on the road gets you up on that hill where you have a better view of
|
|
|
+your future self. One day I saw myself going farther, and then I went farther.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+What do you see yourself doing? What steps can you take to get a better vantage
|
|
|
+point of where you could be? Little steps is all it takes.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Distraction free :notifications:intention:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-11-27 Wed 09:48]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: distraction-free
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I try to keep notifications in my life to a bare minimum. I get tips from
|
|
|
+friends or co-workers about making sure notifications on my phone are disabled
|
|
|
+while I sleep. I disable them all the time. The one thing I allow are text
|
|
|
+messages to vibrate my Garmin watch, and I'm on the fence as to whether this is
|
|
|
+truly necessary.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+There are people who's professions wont allow this. I get that. But I also know
|
|
|
+that most people build narratives about getting a late night text about the
|
|
|
+health of a loved one to justify always getting pinged when Facebook needs your
|
|
|
+attention, or a new email comes in. These are largely untrue, or at least
|
|
|
+building a process into your life for events that may never happen.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Instead I've made distractions I encounter my own fault. I can't blame Facebook
|
|
|
+for pinging me in the middle of focused work. I took control of what I could and
|
|
|
+my responsibility now is to check for messages when I need to. I check slack
|
|
|
+quite often, after each chunk of work, emails a few times a day, and social
|
|
|
+media rarely.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Have you ever thought about the value of all the different notifications in your
|
|
|
+life? If it not, it may be worthwile to audit all the things that vie for your
|
|
|
+time. It is your time after all, and with ownership comes responsibility.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED In Pursuit of Flow
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-12-02 Mon 14:02]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: in-pursuit-of-flow
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I don't make a habit of watch the Olympics. But I remember a moment back in 2018
|
|
|
+when I happened to turn on coverage just as they were televising a gold-winning
|
|
|
+snowboard cross run by Red Gerard[fn:1]. He blew out all the other riders in his group
|
|
|
+to take the gold. Silver was significantly behind him. What stood out to me
|
|
|
+watching him ride, however, was how keyed in he was to the whole thing.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I don't know how much snowboarders are allowed to practice the cross course
|
|
|
+before the event, but given that he was on the hill with 9 other riders who
|
|
|
+didn't look nearly as keyed in meant there was likely more to what was going on
|
|
|
+than simple familiarity with a series of cuts, jumps and bombs.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+What Gerard was, of course, was in flow. I am not sure if you've ever
|
|
|
+experienced flow, but beyond snowboarder cross, the state of mind is also
|
|
|
+illustrated in Zhuang Zhou's philosophical writing from 4th century BCE China.
|
|
|
+In his seminal work, Zhuang discusses a butcher who, having so mastered his
|
|
|
+craft, he is not cutting into an animal, but rather his motion guides the blade
|
|
|
+of the knife through the various cuts he needs to make to perfectly separate the
|
|
|
+carcass.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Life, it seems to me, is the pursuit of flow. In flow, everything goes from one
|
|
|
+to the next without deliberate thought of how to achieve a specific end. There
|
|
|
+is no value judgment on the task achieved. Flow is not about good or bad, it is
|
|
|
+about the accomplishment of a given task. There is different work to be done to
|
|
|
+assess value, but once value has been assessed and it's time to work, we all
|
|
|
+seek flow, that place where don't need to know we're our best selves, but where
|
|
|
+we simply are our best selves and are doing what we set out to do with as little
|
|
|
+thought as possible.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+[fn:1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0nJr_cpYWU
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Creation and Learning :learning:create:mindset:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-12-18 Wed 11:00]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: creation-and-learning
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I recently embarked on a plan to learn to draw. I've done this a few times, in a
|
|
|
+few different ways. This time feels different. The lessons I've begun start with
|
|
|
+some very basic ideas, no home run or get rich quick schemes here. Rather, I
|
|
|
+have a daily exercise of drawing basic shapes, holding the pencil, and just
|
|
|
+getting experience trying to see what I want on the paper before I touch the
|
|
|
+pencil down.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This has been a revelation to me, not least of which because I like these sorts
|
|
|
+of small habit methods for kickstarting new skills. But the other part that has
|
|
|
+been interesting is seeing how things change when I start creating things. I
|
|
|
+often consider learning something new to come with consumption. I read a book,
|
|
|
+watch a video or get instruction from someone else. In this new pattern,
|
|
|
+learning comes from experimentation, comes from creation.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+There's something to this, and I think it's related to other discussions about
|
|
|
+closed versus open mindsets. A consumption mindset intrinsically comes from a
|
|
|
+belief that what will help you be your best self comes from outside of you.
|
|
|
+But experimentation and creation comes from a belief that the help you need is
|
|
|
+already inside of you, you just need room to play with an idea.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This creation can come from writing, drawing, painting, software development,
|
|
|
+sculpture, music composition, active conversations with others, and a myriad
|
|
|
+other places. But the important part is that you give yourself room to
|
|
|
+experiment with what's in your own head. So often we fall into the trap of
|
|
|
+looking for something outside us to kick us into a new mindset, but often
|
|
|
+nurturing the creative spirit can have a much greater effect.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+One last observation, most of the disciplines I rattled off above fall into the
|
|
|
+realm of art at some level. There's truth there too. The thing that sets us free
|
|
|
+as humans and helps us to be our best self is often the exploration of the edges
|
|
|
+where mundane day-to-day life interacts with what we humans call art.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Create more art. Explore your mind. Explore your world. Watch your creativity
|
|
|
+and ability to learn blossom. Then, perhaps most importantly, spend some time
|
|
|
+helping someone else discover the magic of creation.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT Mindset and gratitude :gratitude:mindset:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Most of the time, when you're having a down day and someone tries to remind you
|
|
|
+to be grateful it takes effort not to punch them in the face, or at the very
|
|
|
+least to glare reproachfully. Which is unfortunate, because it's in those
|
|
|
+moments that we most need the perspective that comes with gratitude.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT Planting seeds :ideas:plant:consquences:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Warren Buffet once said, "if we can't tolerate a possible consequence, remote
|
|
|
+though it may be, we steer clear of planting its seeds." What consequences might
|
|
|
+he have been thinking about? Given his position as a savvy investor, it's
|
|
|
+tempting to think he was talking about financial returns and, effectively
|
|
|
+gambling. Stated another way, don't gamble with anything you can't afford to
|
|
|
+lose.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+But he used a planting metaphor. Last time I checked few people consider
|
|
|
+gambling a form of seed planting. There's an inherent risk to gambling that I
|
|
|
+don't think Buffet was after. No, I don't think that's what he had in mind.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Buffet is warning about the long-term. Seeds are inherently strategic. When you
|
|
|
+choose to plant half an acre of corn and 400 yards of tomatoes, you're
|
|
|
+committing that much land to those crops for the bulk of the year. In most of
|
|
|
+North America that's a huge time and space commitment. Nothing else will be able
|
|
|
+to grow there until the harvest comes in.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+So what about Buffet's metaphor now?
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT [#B] Blog post on how to dream big and then aggressively de-scope :onec:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+When you're starting a new project you should harness your enthusiasm to talk
|
|
|
+through (or write down) all the awesome things you could do with the new feature
|
|
|
+or tool.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Once you've laid out the big dream, you have to "de-scope" the project to break
|
|
|
+it into pieces that can actually be completed. You could call this the MVP
|
|
|
+process, and I suppose it is, but I've not heard it explained in quite this way
|
|
|
+before.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+*** Dream big, out loud
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Start the project either with your team, or by yourself, of writing down and
|
|
|
+turning over in your head all the awesome things you could do with this new
|
|
|
+functionality. Map it all out, and get a good sense of how it will solve the
|
|
|
+customer's need, whether you're a startup and have early adopters, or this is to
|
|
|
+scratch your own itch.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Work hard to find the limits of the value of the various features. The value
|
|
|
+proposition will be worth it's weight in gold in the next step
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+*** Break it down
|
|
|
+*** Common traps
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The idea here would be to avoid trying to break the big dream into resource
|
|
|
+pieces. It's tempting to think in a sort of Kanban manner of saying, well if
|
|
|
+backend can deliver this piece first, then frontend can come in and add
|
|
|
+our killer UI in the next step. In order to deliver value early and often, you
|
|
|
+have to de-scope without breaking the project into non-functional pieces, or at
|
|
|
+least, limited-functionality pieces.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT In Our Own Head
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: in-our-own-head
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Des Linden, finishing the Boston Marathon this year in a horizontal rain when it
|
|
|
+was eight degrees above freezing was more than just finishing a race. In fact,
|
|
|
+everyone who finished the race this year deserves major credit for pushing
|
|
|
+themselves. And yet, Linden did it while running faster than everyone else. I
|
|
|
+remember watching her take the lead around the 20th mile. She made her move and
|
|
|
+the previous first place racer didn't even try to keep up. Linden appeared to
|
|
|
+have hit a gear no one else had on that chilly, Boston morning.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Thinking about her run after the fact, I am humbled by the fact that no one
|
|
|
+knows what stories of adversity and struggle lead people success. Occasionally
|
|
|
+someone is famous enough to have a story told in public, but more often than
|
|
|
+not, struggles are private, even kept to oneself. While it was possible to watch
|
|
|
+Linden struggle with horizontal rain, who knows what physical barriers others
|
|
|
+are pushing through every day.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT The Dark Hypothesis :consequences:
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: dark-hypothesis
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The lack of other life forms in our observable universe prompts us to ask a lot
|
|
|
+of questions. Carl Sagan was optimistic that the lack of evidence in such an
|
|
|
+expanse was not cause for alarm that we are alone. And yet, the absence of
|
|
|
+current life anywhere remotely close to us, despite increasing archaeological
|
|
|
+evidence of ancient life on Mars begins to paint a picture that life does, find
|
|
|
+a way, but may be rare, indeed.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+So here's my dark hypothesis. COVID19 was inevitable. So was COVID20, 21 and all
|
|
|
+future pandemics.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+* Emacs :@emacs:
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Reading Lists :spacemacs:tools:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-08-20 Mon 22:06]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: reading-lists
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Oh Goodreads. Your website is a cluttered mess. Your UX hasn't been improved in years. The only value I derive from keeping my reading list on you is that my friends can see what I'm reading. Which is a neat trick, but since I've mostly given up on Facebook too, it not really enough to keep me.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I was an early adopter of Goodreads, but my life has taken a turn towards the personal and the text-based. I use Emacs (via [spacemacs](spacemacs.org)) as much as I can. Org-mode might be the single most impressive IDEA rendered into software I've ever seen. It simply makes the things I use on a regular basis more powerful and expressive, which is not something I can say for Word, Twitter, or Chrome. Those are merely tools. They don't amplify my ability to document and create.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Really the post /[Leaving Goodreads](https://lepisma.github.io/2017/06/29/leaving-goodreads/index.html)/ is what convinced me to go, one more time, back to my reading list in org mode. But the killer feature this time around was [ox-hugo](https://ox-hugo.scripter.co/), which allows me to easily dump Org-mode subtrees into a hugo-powered blog directory. A simple ~rsync~ later and I can publish random subtrees, including book reviews!
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The whole thing is so elegant, I couldn't have dreamed up the process if I had tried. The whole thing was truly an evolution of tools, and one that was only possible because each tool, Emacs, spacemacs, org-mode, hugo, ox-hugo, does it's job so elegantly.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Spacemacs :spacemacs:tools:
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_DATE: 2017-09-19
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: spacemacs
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Emacs is very powerful. Amazingly so. But it's so arcane, the keystrokes could
|
|
|
+take you years to master. So what's a developer to do?
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Enter spacemacs. I honestly don't know where this idea came from, and my brain
|
|
|
+is structured in such a way that I could have ever pulled it off myself. But an
|
|
|
+emacs configured like Vim (thank you evil mode) with discoverable keystrokes ...
|
|
|
+I am always flabergasted.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Tonight I discovered how to open the kill ring. While it sounds aggressive, it's
|
|
|
+really just Emacs version of a clipboard. Anything you cut or copy ends up on
|
|
|
+the kill ring. For so long I treated it like the opaque clipboard on so many
|
|
|
+operating systems. The last thing I cut is the only thing I have access to. And
|
|
|
+God help me if I cut something else, because I'll lose the last thing to
|
|
|
+oblivion.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+But not anymore, baby. With an interactive kill ring (SPC-r-y for those of you
|
|
|
+following along at home) you get a searchable compendium of everything you've
|
|
|
+cut or copied in the current session. Absolutely brilliant.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Another Engine :hugo:tools:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-08-18 Sat 01:01]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: another-engine
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Once, I used Jekyll. Then I switched to Pelican. I'm finally here on Hugo, and
|
|
|
+hoping that this will make it easier to keep things updated. The eternal
|
|
|
+question when chosing a method to publish a blog is, why publish a blog. I don't
|
|
|
+really have an answer for that yet. I wish I did. Honestly, I do. You don't have
|
|
|
+to believe me, because I believe in myself, and if this is all one big
|
|
|
+simulation, you don't matter anyway.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Incidentally, perhaps the best part of this transition is the
|
|
|
+[ox-hugo](https://ox-hugo.scripter.co/) plugin, which makes writing new posts
|
|
|
+and publishing them a dream. Now, instead of some complicated cocktail of adding
|
|
|
+a new file with the write filename and proper metadata, I can just org-mode
|
|
|
+capture the thing. The more I use emacs (and specifically
|
|
|
+[spacemacs](http://spacemacs.org)), the more in love I am.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Doomed Emacs :tools:doom_emacs:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-10-31 Wed 09:27]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: doomed-emacs
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+After a year or so of dedicating myself to getting Spacemacs setup just right, I
|
|
|
+made a pretty substanial jump a few weeks ago. I'm now running [[https://github.com/hlissner/doom-emacs][doom-emacs]] which
|
|
|
+provides fewer nice surprises (missing evil-surround shortcuts by default) than
|
|
|
+spacemacs, but loads much ... much faster. The other day I found myself coding
|
|
|
+while sharing my screen on Zoom and is was painfully obvious what price I was
|
|
|
+paying for spacemacs not cleaning up after itself and generally lazy loading
|
|
|
+things leading to less than fast context switching.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I was willing to struggle through some the slower operations for my own sake,
|
|
|
+but getting caught with other people watching as my editor on a brand new
|
|
|
+computer struggled to do basic things like searching for symbols in the codebase
|
|
|
+was embarrassing.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I'm not done with Spacemacs. I still love the idea, and I also believe that half
|
|
|
+the problem was likely the way I was using it and configuring it. But part of
|
|
|
+the appeal of spacemacs are the defaults. And it was the defaults that was
|
|
|
+making it hard to use it on a daily basis.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Another nice aspect of Doom Emacs is that aside from a handful of evil-mode
|
|
|
+shortcuts, a lot of what you're encouraged to use are stock emacs keystrokes.
|
|
|
+That means that I'm not learning some cryptic layer on org mode when I use
|
|
|
+emacs, I using the default keystrokes that I will find in vanilla emacs. That's
|
|
|
+very useful and will hopefully make me a more respectable member of the emacs
|
|
|
+community, rather than a vim outcast.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Continuous tool improvement :tools:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-08-25]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: continuous-tool-improvement
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I was reviewing the feeds I subscribe to in [[https://github.com/skeeto/elfeed][elfeed]] this evening when it occurred
|
|
|
+to me that a lot of my feeds have to do with Emacs. I will often blow through
|
|
|
+updates on feeds, making sure to only pickup things that are truly useful. But I
|
|
|
+discovered an amazingly high signal to noise ratio regarding tips for using
|
|
|
+Emacs more effectively. This got me thinking about how I couldn't possible
|
|
|
+remember all this stuff, so I tossed some of the things I was learning in my
|
|
|
+learnings.org file to review later. At that point, it dawned on my how important
|
|
|
+tool choice is, and how important it is to learn how to use your tools
|
|
|
+effectively and be receptive to learning new things about them.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This could apply equally to any well made tool for any discipline (woodworking,
|
|
|
+drawing, research), but for me that means Emacs. Not everyone is going to ever
|
|
|
+need to touch Emacs. For me, I can't imagine not having it, and everytime I
|
|
|
+learn something new, I get a little more effective with it.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+For reference, tonight [[http://xenodium.com/#actionable-urls-in-emacs-buffers][I learned how to make all URLs, regardless of buffer,
|
|
|
+clickable]] [[https://scripter.co/splitting-an-org-block-into-two/][I also learned how to break an org-mode block in two with a single
|
|
|
+keystroke to insert a comment]].
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Email in Emacs :tools:notmuch:email:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2018-11-28 Wed 11:00]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: email-in-emacs
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I really did try mu4e. Really. But the setup required a custom emacs build on
|
|
|
+macos, and I am unfortunately constrained to Macs for work at the moment, so it
|
|
|
+was kind of a non-starter to jump through so many hoops to get it working. And
|
|
|
+of course, I also highly value resilience, and nothing says unresilient than not
|
|
|
+being able to successfully build a crucial feature like mail handling into your
|
|
|
+editor of choice.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+So that occassioned a turn towards notmuch. Oh my, how delightful. At it's
|
|
|
+simplest, notmuch is just a xapian-powered tag database for your email. Imagine
|
|
|
+that, no crazy indexers or long-polling to check for new email. Notmuch just
|
|
|
+tags and allows you to search your email.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Combined with isync's mbsync and msmtp, I now have a really functional /and/
|
|
|
+resilient email seutp in Emacs. Even more delightful is looking through my tag
|
|
|
+database and realizing that if I tag things effectively, finding all those board
|
|
|
+agenda emails for church are just a tag search away.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Of course, such things were always available in Gmail or a mail client. But I
|
|
|
+was always unimpressed with how slow Thunderbird or Mail.app got with lots of
|
|
|
+messages. And Google is reading all my messages, so that sucks too.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Combine the ease of syncing and tagging messages, and the fact that they exist
|
|
|
+in a directory on my computer, synced via Dropbox to all my other computers and
|
|
|
+my email suddenly mine again, not living on an IMAP server that I hope doesn't
|
|
|
+fail me.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Why Emacs? :onec:emacs:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2020-01-21 Tue 11:45]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: emacs-everywhere
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+There's an argument to be made for ease of use in software. The epiphany with
|
|
|
+Apple software in the early part of the 21st century was that most users had
|
|
|
+tasks they wanted done. They did not want to use a computer to do them, per se.
|
|
|
+But if a computer could do them, that was okay.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The problem with this perspective is that it assumes a certain amount of
|
|
|
+laziness—or perhaps lack of discrimination‒on the part of the user. There are
|
|
|
+some excellent times to be lazy, but choice of tools is not one of them. Ask any
|
|
|
+accomplished carpenter if the Home Depot plane and the Lee Nielson plane is the
|
|
|
+same tool. They are not. But let us explore this analogy a bit more. It's
|
|
|
+actually damned appropriate.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+If a computer and the software running on it are tools, then, like a carpenter,
|
|
|
+an experienced computer user should be discriminating in their tools. This
|
|
|
+perspective took me a long time to arrive at. I enjoy learning about my tools.
|
|
|
+And yet, I have watched a number of highly productive software developers not
|
|
|
+give a second thought to their tools. Perhaps it's more fair to say they do not
|
|
|
+give a thought to how their tools work.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+This lack of curiosity in the things that enable their work means they will
|
|
|
+always suffer when their tool breaks. At some fundamental level they do not know
|
|
|
+how they are doing what they're doing. Any furniture maker knows at a basic
|
|
|
+level how a table planer works. Do you understand your linter works? How about
|
|
|
+the request and response cycle in your browser? The algorithm that kicks out
|
|
|
+the most appropriate answer on StackOverflow? I hope you've answered /yes/ to at
|
|
|
+least one of those. But what about how a compiler works? A JIT scripting
|
|
|
+language compiler? These are all the tools of our trade.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+In the case of software there's an even worse fate. What happens when your tool
|
|
|
+doesn't even allow you to be curious about it? Closed source software, or even
|
|
|
+just limited access to the source means you are working with a black box. You
|
|
|
+couldn't learn how it worked even if you wanted to. I can think of a worse fate
|
|
|
+for someone who does something professionally.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+All this is a round about way to explain why I am drawn to Emacs and tools like
|
|
|
+it. Popular open source tools that have survived, at this point /literally/, for
|
|
|
+generations of builders. There will always be a new and shiny thing. But I have
|
|
|
+made an intentional effort to lean into the open source tools that have served
|
|
|
+the curious among us for a long time now.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I encourage you to find some part of the software stack that allows you to do
|
|
|
+work and lean into it. Learn why it exists, how it is built, the people who
|
|
|
+built it, and maybe even how you can help build it in the future.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** PUBLISHED Email in Emacs Redux :tools:email:notmuch:
|
|
|
+CLOSED: [2019-12-04 Wed 11:33]
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: email-in-emacs-redux
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I have moved to reading and responding to all my email in Emacs. I honestly
|
|
|
+didn't think I would ever be able to make this jump because of silly things like
|
|
|
+signatures, HTML email and my address book. But the reality of how I actually
|
|
|
+use email on a day to day basis is a big part of why this was possible.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+As it happens, most of my email work is replying to other people. As an engineer
|
|
|
+on a product team I start very few email threads, and even fewer with people
|
|
|
+outside the organization. Thus, the lack of the company standard HTML signature
|
|
|
+in my outgoing emails is rarely a problem. On the once or twice a month
|
|
|
+occurrence of needing to send an external-facing email, I can pop open Gmail in
|
|
|
+a browser and take care of it.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+But for quickly replying to folks, parsing tasks into my daypage (more on this
|
|
|
+later) and saving content to read later, Notmuch has been a dream.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+So the cat's out of the bag. As in my last post about email in Emacs, I use
|
|
|
+Notmuch along with mbsync for getting email and msmtp to send email. I also host
|
|
|
+my own email server on a Digital Ocean VPS running mailinabox [fn:1]. This makes
|
|
|
+the configuration with mbsync and msmtp pretty painless.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The other important discovery I made is muchsync [fn:2]. This allows me to run
|
|
|
+the mbsync task for looking for new email on a server in the house that's always
|
|
|
+on. Then each other device I want to read and respond to email just runs a
|
|
|
+`muchsync` task that hits up that server and syncs the state of the notmuch tag
|
|
|
+database.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+The result is delightful. I can clear out my inbox on one machine and find it
|
|
|
+all cleared up on all the others. Combine that with the ability to quickly
|
|
|
+respond to email within Emacs, copy links to specific messages and capture them
|
|
|
+to Org Mode, and archive things I don't care about, the whole thing is really effective.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+One aspect of this is that I have my email setup to default to showing the
|
|
|
+plaintext version, with a tab-able HTML view powered by eww. This works
|
|
|
+surprisingly well. As usual, my configuration is in my dotfiles, specifically
|
|
|
+my `+mail.el` [fn:3] configuration in Doom Emacs.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Check it out and I hope you can get a handle on your email.
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+[fn:1] https://mailinabox.email
|
|
|
+[fn:2] http://www.muchsync.org
|
|
|
+[fn:3] https://git.unbl.ink/secstate/dotfiles/src/branch/master/emacs/.config/doom/+mail.el
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT Getting things done with Emacs :onec:emacs:
|
|
|
+:PROPERTIES:
|
|
|
+:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: getting-things-done-emacs
|
|
|
+:END:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+I've gone back and forth a few times with trying to use Org Mode to manage my :w
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+** DRAFT [#A] Blog post on leaving LSP behind in favor of eglot :onec:
|
|
|
+
|
|
|
+Upshot here is that LSP is pretty cumbersome with different packages for
|
|
|
+different languages and having the kitchen sink enabled by default. Eglot has a
|
|
|
+very simple interface and is pretty easy to reason about. I value being able to
|
|
|
+reason about things, as it's generally a good litmus test for design quailty and
|
|
|
+also means that while I don't comprehend everything about how LSP interaction
|
|
|
+with Emacs is implemented, I could if I wanted to.
|
