Life's Little Joys

17:47 Wednesday, 2 August 2023
Current Wx: Temp: 75.29°F Pressure: 1013hPa Humidity: 94% Wind: 5.93mph
Words: 694

So yesterday's project got sidetracked by old Hewlett-Packard handheld computers. That's another story.

But I couldn't sleep, so I figured I'd just get up and play around with Tinderbox. It's taken about an hour, but I've achieved success! The project isn't complete yet, but this progress is "noteworthy."

I created a "blog test vehicle" Tinderbox document. A file that I know I'd want to export as a web page in the form of a blog, and one that, not coincidentally, somewhat resembles the marmot.

One of the "features" of a blog is an archive of past posts. I put "features" in scare-quotes, because none of this is carved in stone, it's just the convention most familiar to me. You can structure your blog however you want.

I've organized my archives by year, each year containing twelve monthly archives, an html file of a month's posts, named by month and year.

Each year, I have to create a new container for that year's archives. I figured that's where I'd start in automating some of the maintenance features. Why not let the Archive container create the container for the year's archive?

Notes are containers in Tinderbox. They contain the text of the note, and a lot of other things called "attributes." Some of those attributes are little programs that work on other notes and other attributes. There's an "Inspector" window that let's you work on many of those attributes, the one's you're most likely to want to have easy access to in one convenient facility. One of the tabs in the Inspector is the Action Inspector, where you can store the code or little program. This is the place where much frustration, sorrow and suffering often resides.

It's also the place where the cool stuff happens.

I figured I'd have to write a bunch of logic that would tell the Archive note to look at all the other notes and see if any of them are named the current year, and if not, then create a new note with the current year as its name. I was kind of dreading this, but it was pretty damn simple.

Since I only need to create this container once a year, I placed the program in the Edict pane of the Action Inspector. An "edict" is a rule that's run relatively infrequently, you can read about when it's run here. My little program looks like this:

$MyDate="today";

$MyString=$MyDate.year;

create($MyString);

The cool part is "create" checks to see if the note it's trying to create already exists. If it does, it doesn't do anything. All that comparison logic (Which wouldn't be that hard, except it's parsing "date" data types, which I wasn't looking forward to because it can get a little tricky.)

Now that I have a container for the year, I want that container to create the container for the current month's posts. So I add an Edict to that note.

That little program looks like this:

$MyDate="today";

$MyString=$MyDate.format("MM y");

create($MyString);

What saves you a lot of hassle is that ".format" operator. Names of notes are strings, so we need to coerce a "date" data-type into a string in order to look for notes with the same name (which "create" does automatically, in the background). We want our month name to follow a particular convention, and that convention is defined by the variables in the ".format" operator, where "MM" connotes the full name of the month, i.e. "August," and "y" connotes the 4-digit year. The space between "MM" and "y" is relevant as well.

So the Edict looks at today's date, converts it to a string that looks like "August 2023," then checks to see if there's already a note by that name. If not, it creates the note, and does nothing if there already is.

In order to not have to type that little program in, we need to make a prototype year container, which contains this program already baked-in.

That's a topic for another day. It seems I may be building a generic Tinderbox blog file.

But gosh, don't I feel smart?!

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Catoctin Mountain Highway

06:42 Friday, 2 August 2024

Current Wx: Temp: 77.2°F Pressure: 1018hPa Humidity: 90% Wind: 3.44mph
Words: 359

I think I spelled that right.

Walked this morning with the sticks. Unremarkable performance. Maybe I'm tired.

Best part was a thin sliver of a red crescent moon rising above the trees. I'd have taken a photo if I'd felt more motivated.

So this nondescript bit of nothing, which I shot while getting gas in Maryland on July 21, will fill in. It's as "meh" as I feel.

A good day yesterday for a lot of folks. I think Joe Biden showed why it still matters to have statesmen in the White House. But nobody likes to read about politics, so that's enough about that I guess.

Mitzi's been going through the house packing up stuff to take to the place up in New York, even though we haven't closed yet. She's thinking about using a pod, though I think they're too large. Can certainly carry more than the car, and may be cheaper than boxing stuff up and shipping it. Maybe I'll add some books and radios.

She's getting pretty excited, though we still have some travel coming up.

One thing that was nice about New York was that you could be outside in the afternoon. It might be hot in the sun, but it was pleasant in the shade. Here, forget it. You go out to get the mail and back in. It's just miserable. Some people tolerate it better than others I guess. We have a couple of neighbors who are smokers, who apparently don't like to smoke in the house. They're outside in their screened porch a lot.

It's just as well it's hot and we're staying indoors. If it was nice, we'd be outside and, depending on which way the breeze was blowing, smelling their cigarettes. It's weird, I used to be accustomed to the smell of cigarettes many years ago. I didn't smoke, but a lot of the people around me did. Now, you don't encounter it as much and it feels intrusive and offensive.

I don't think the inflatable kayak will be here today or tomorrow. I didn't get a shipping notice until Wednesday. We'll see. It's not urgent by any means.

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Community and Control

13:37 Friday, 2 August 2024
Current Wx: Temp: 92.41°F Pressure: 1017hPa Humidity: 68% Wind: 8.05mph
Words: 1006

Jack sent me an email about "talking politics," which I will respond to directly. (And probably later. Mitzi's on her way home from Home Depot with a cabinet I'm going to have to assemble.)

What has prompted this post is something Amit Gawande posted in his blog, On Politics and Communities. And I think this has helped clarify, for me anyway, my feelings about "social" media and "communities," and the illusions we bring to these virtual spaces.

Amit writes:

After all, social media is a resource, just like a piece of land. You can set up any form of community on a piece of land—a country, a city, or a neighbourhood. With each having its own set of rules. Society functions best when you allow all of that. The same applies to social media. Every person who sets one up should be free to decide on its size and nature.

I don't think this is very clearly written, or well considered. Is "social media" a resource? In what context?

Before going much farther into that, this sentence is also rather amorphous, "You can set up any form of community on a piece of land."

Really? Who can? Who is "you"? I think what Amit's saying is that land is a resource that supports many different kinds of communities in the real world, and that there may be different rules depending on the type of community.

But, "Any form of community?" I'm not certain, since land is a real, finite and constrained resource; and to the best of my knowledge, virtually all of it is governed by a set of rules the proverbial "you" Amit refers to will be constrained by. Else, why would tech-bro billionaires want to set up floating islands where they can indulge in their libertarian Lord of the Flies fantasies?

I don't know what Amit means when he writes "society functions best when you allow all of that." I think he's referring to different forms of community, based on scale maybe? Country, city, neighborhood? Though again, I'm unclear as to who "you" would be to "allow" that.

There are "communities" that aren't geographically defined. I'm thinking of "communities of practice," where professionals interact together to advance the interests of their profession, and presumably the people they serve. These are more like the virtual communities of "social media." They share professional interests in common, some of which might be considered "intellectual property."

I live in a "gated community," not only is it gated, it's age-restricted. You have to be over-55 to own a home here. It has a "homeowners association," which includes a set of governing documents that outline the rules that tell you, very specifically, how you're allowed to live here. To be frank, it often chafes. But "we made the choice," right? Except there are very few homes being built these days in Florida that aren't in an association. So, even "choice," is a constrained resource.

Part of the reason, and I'm not saying it's a good reason, why these kinds of communities are so tightly regulated is because many people regard their home as their most significant investment, and they don't want their "property value," to be adversely affected by the quirks and predilections of their neighbors.

Similarly, perhaps, professional communities don't want to see their "intellectual property" values depreciated, so they have professional standards and licensure to exclude people who may wish to "practice" within the domain of that professional community, but whose quirks and predilections may adversely affect the reputation of the profession, and presumably the people they serve.

Ivermectin, anyone?

But with Mastodon and similar applications and protocols, individuals privileged with the knowledge and material resources can set up small instances of "social media," and then impose rules. "My house, my rules."

Okay, sure. But that's not a "community." That's your house.

And it's not about fostering a sense of community, it's about hosting a party where the guests are only present at the pleasure and indulgence of the host. There is no shared interest among the other guests that's intended to be advanced by attending that "house party." Maybe they all like photography or they're all passionate about the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but there is no shared interest that they are working together to advance. They're all just guests at the host's party and when the host says, "Party's over! Get the fuck out!"

Well, that's the end of that "community."

I live in a gated community. My wife likes the gates. She doesn't agree with me when I say, "Gates only inconvenience honest people."

I have to say, I actually appreciate some of the rules. You can't fly a Trump flag from your house. I wouldn't mind one or two or three. But if they allowed it, most of the place would be festooned with them. That gets pretty oppressive. (They default to flying the American flag. Last election, they lined the streets. Nearly every house. Once Trump lost, more than 90% of them disappeared. I'm trying to recall when they appeared in 2020. So far, they haven't shown up yet.)

And since I do live here, not just type its address in a browser window, it's more pleasant when we can maintain some sense of comity with one another, and that particular rule seems to help foster that.

As a career naval officer, I understand rules and order and have no problem with them in their appropriate context. "We don't discuss politics or religion in the wardroom."

I do think we ought to be a little more clear about our terminology. These social media instances are not "communities," virtual, online or otherwise. I suppose they could be. A community of interest might use that network infrastructure to support the work of the community, but that's not what much of this discussion has been about.

These bespoke social media instances are not communities, and calling them that is self-aggrandizing.

They're more like house parties.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

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Blaugust?

07:01 Saturday, 2 August 2025
Current Wx: Temp: 48.72°F Pressure: 1027hPa Humidity: 96% Wind: 1.74mph
Words: 396

Note the temperature. It's a bit warmer here, though. 52°F, and I'm not complaining. I love it. (Ask me again when it gets down into the 40s.)

I saw someone refer to this month as "Blaugust," though I don't know if that's supposed to be some tag or meme or something. I don't keep up with the meta-sphere as much anymore, though a lot of the blogs I follow post mainly about blogging, which is pretty meta.

Achilles is stiff this morning, but not on fire, which is a relief. Put some pics up at Flickr from yesterday's walk down the hill. They're not art, but I think they capture some of the beauty of this place.

Mitzi wants to head into Elmira this morning and check out Mark Twain's grave, so I guess we'll do that once I take care of the trash. Means I'll miss the Tinderbox Meetup, but we haven't done much exploring lately, so I guess we should get out of the house and do some and it's a nice day today.

The Florida house is having a glitch with the thermostat. Last time this happened, I had to use the shop-vac to clear a clog in the condensate line. A float switch in the condensate pan cuts power to the thermostat when it doesn't drain properly to prevent it from overflowing and causing water damage. It started acting up while Mitzi was down there for her conference, and I had her go out and try and clear it, but she didn't get any water. It's possible I didn't explain it right.

Anyway, our realtor scheduled a visit from our HVAC company on Tuesday and they should get it sorted. Seems weird because they were just out there for the summer service while I was up here at the end of May. And of course I declined to pay to renew the maintenance agreement, so I'm sure this visit is going to be extra expensive.

Such is life.

I'd comment on the corruption and malfeasance taking place in the highest halls of government, but it just depresses me; more so because it seems like somewhere between thirty to forty percent of my fellow citizens happen to think it represents "good government."

Or "owning the libs," which probably amounts to the same thing for them.

Anyway, the beat goes on...

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Breathing

14:43 Sunday, 2 August 2026
Current Wx: Temp: 69.35°F Pressure: 1010hPa Humidity: 92% Wind: 16.28mph
Words: 512

Slowly beginning to get back in the groove after the departure of our guests. I was exhausted Friday and Saturday, and didn't sleep well last night, but today I've been able to make some progress on getting things back in order around here.

Loren offers a keen bit of insight on Apple's Upgrade program. Pay attention, or pay someone else!

I ordered a new Magic Mouse yesterday when my wrist started aching as I was using the track pad. Maybe varying the way I interact with the machine will reduce the risk of repetitive stress injury. (I should probably also practice more keyboard shortcuts.)

Michael offers some worthwhile relationship advice in case there are any single people reading the marmot. Intentionally oriented toward the younger demographic.

Another Mike offers a link to a story about modernity's layers of technical debt and problems begetting problems. Have to get to the root causes, and they are deep.

The slab got poured on Friday. Brad met with a friend to go over the plans and come up with a plan for framing the load-bearing walls so we can set the floor trusses.

I woke up at about 2:00 am, thinking about the plumbing the ducting and worrying how they might be competing for the same space. I really think anyone considering building a custom home needs to decide how they want to do their HVAC first. Ducts tend to be larger than pipes, which is why a hydronic system is often a big advantage. Hydronic piping is smaller than drain piping, and it's flexible, so it's relatively easy to route.

We'll figure it out, but it does cause a certain amount of anxiety and consternation.

The low-voltage lighting order is in and paid for, but we hadn't picked out the DC ceiling fans yet. So we did that yesterday. It was then that I realized that the only time you really care about how a ceiling fan looks is when you're buying it.

Because after that, it's mostly invisible. Which just means, don't obsess over how the damn things look!

I spent some time this morning getting Captain's Log caught up with email. I wasn't able to really do much in the way of recording things when our guests were here. As I got the latest emails recorded, I noticed I hadn't been keeping up with tagging entries so I did that too.

And that exercise also exposed a number of little utilities I'd purchased, but looking at them in the email, I couldn't tell you what they did. So I went back and found the web sites and included links and descriptions in the text of the entry. More about that later.

Maybe.

Hulu is streaming The Devil Wears Prada 2, Mitzi watched it the other night and I caught most of it. Gorgeous photography, and I thought the story was entertaining.

Hulu also has a two-part National Geographic documentary about Troy, which was fascinating.

Well, enough about all that.

The beat that can be counted is not the beat...

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