Lazy Reading for 2013/08/25

This week, I’m opinionated on every link.

  • An 80s computer ad that got almost everything correct.  It used to be sci-fi environments were super-clean – now they’re dirty, with ubiquitous electronics.  That’s something that could be picture-blogged to prove, but I ain’t doing it.
  • Bunnie Huang does “exit interviews” when he stops using equipment.  Given his electronics knowledge, he goes into a lot of detail, including pictures through a microscope.  Speaking of this, how has my ancient HTC Incredible survived 3 years of trips into a salt mine?  I don’t know.
  • InterTwinkles, open source group decision making software.  Don’t know how well it works, but it certainly seems like the right idea.  (via)
  • Turning the Apple //e into a Lisp machine, part 1.  They don’t actually get to the Lisp machine part, but it talks about how Apple computers could load data through the audio jack.  I remember doing that with a tape player, too.  It sucked.  (via)
  • kOS.  It’s so minimal that I am not sure what it can do or how to use it, but it’s also so minimal that I’m sure there must be something to it.  (via)
  • Building a Chording Keyboard.  I’ve mentioned the Microwriter and Twiddler before, but this article goes into a lot of detail about the actual construction of a home-made unit.  (also via)
  • Book review: The Healthy Programmer.  It may or may not make you exercise, but it will make you feel a little guilty about sitting and reading the web like you are doing right now.
  • Hyphen, en dash, em dash, minus.  So few people know there’s a difference.  (via)
  • ASCII Art.  History of, examples, and so on.  (via, with video)
  • Five Useful Git Tips.  Git tips come up all the time, but this one is interesting because it’s using “showterm“, which lets you make text-based animations?  movies? to show a work process in a terminal.  I think I may have linked to something similar before, but this is good.
  • How to Avoid the Emacs Pinky Problem.  A neat idea, but some of the suggestions are actually going to make it worse.  (via)
  • Vim: revisited.  Decent ideas, and the links at the end are good further reading.  There, I’ve posted on both sides of the editor issue.  (via)
  • The problem with Vim.  (via)

Your unrelated link of the week: the Scary Godmother Doll.  One of my favorite illustrators, building a doll.  I met the creator years ago in Pittsburgh; she is an astonishingly energetic person.