1 Bad Disclaimer
I originally started writing this post immediately after my last one, but life happened. I have made a few edits to make it read more like I wrote it today, but some of it might still read like something written at different times from different perspectives.
2 Working on free software for my day job, off the clock
Mostly in December through the beginning of February, I put quite a bit of my free time contributing to other projects. But I did spend some time working on a few of my own.
I don't want to get into everything I've been working on recently. Most of it isn't very exciting, except for the MED frontend, which originally started off as an example for students, then a capstone project, and now a working person details vuejs app. It works, it has some issues, it needs tests, there's slop, and I wrote it in my spare time along over the last two years. Several things I would have done differently if I had started working on it last month, say.
The original project was python, but in my day job I use several other languages, one of which has quite a bit of legacy, which it might be obvious what some of the code I currently maintain uses. In the past, I've developed plugins using dynamic rather than using an Interface. The problem with using an Interface is the Plugins need to have some kind of knowledge of the type, so for a namespace with typed Interfaces, this can be difficult if something changes. Optionally, if both the main program and the plugins inherent from a third library, then both are dependent on the same code.
On the other hand, with the dynamic type, all that needs to happen to keep the polymorphism is an agreement for naming the members. And they can then return whatever they want, but again, dynamic or other primitives work best when trying to avoid moving targets.
3 Case trapped in his wetware
I'm mostly, but not entirely recovered from getting hit by the car. A few other things have come up, don't really want to get into it all, except to say the effects of the crash, albeit it at such a low speed, have affect my body, mind, and wallet. Monetarily, to put it into perspective, I've spent more on repairing my body over the last two months, so to speak, than I have on computer parts over the last two years. Thank goodness for insurance.
3.1 Trumpets
I have, however, managed to acquire a trumpet. With the injuries, I had some difficulty playing my guitar because I need my left hand. But my right hand works just fine. So for the first time in years, I've started playing a brass instrument again, not very well, but good enough to play a scale, taps, and twinkle twinkle little star.
4 War
The war in Ukraine, though not the only war in the world, happens to be a war that has affected my close, extended family directly.
5 Why Rude English
The topic of deprecating some words came up at work again today. It reminded me of a conversation that I used to hear my mom talk about between her and her father. I heard the retelling of that conversation several times, growing up. It has had a significant and positive impact on my values.
All of that said, some words a person should probably never use. Some other words might only come across rude in some contexts, but if they have an alternative, using the alternative avoids any potential conflict. But some words can take hundreds of years to phase out. It seems possible that some words could change meaning over time such that they go from neutral to rude to not rude. For example, certainly the expression "that sucks" has become so overused that using it around co-workers in the 1980s when some might have considered it obscene, these days I could probably expect to hear it said in the workplace with much worry or concern.
Does that make all words a hazard that we risk rudeness with each sentence?
6 Don't Say Gay
If I had as much money as the world's dragons, I could start a harmless, though potentially effective campaign to stop these kinds of censorship and shaming. I could target the extreme alt right appropriation of my culture:
Just remember, even Thor dressed in drag; Loki birthed a child; Njord was trans; Odin was all of the above.
7 Black Holes, Big Bang, White Holes
See the video below. On one hand, there are some privacy concerns, "Stay out of my head" kind of things. But in the sea of the infinite, it gives me hope…
8 Reading
- https://curl.se/docs/manual.html#custom-output
- https://everything.curl.dev/usingcurl/verbose/writeout
- https://httpwg.org/specs/rfc7540.html
- https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/article/introduction-to-building-a-plug-in-architecture-using-C-Sharp/
- https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/4691/Plugin-Architecture-using-C
- https://www.democracymatrix.com/
- https://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/string-manipulation.html