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+++ Gophernicus is Back +++ |
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Sunday, September 30, 2018 |
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I see tomasino posted a bboard request [0] to revert gopher.club |
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back to gophernicus, and also to upgrade it, and it appears that is |
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done now. Very nice! |
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[0] gopher://gopher.black/1/phlog/20180929-sdf-gopher-servers |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ SDF Nuked Gophernicus Again +++ |
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Friday, September 28, 2018 |
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Sigh. It seems gopher.club has changed its gopherd to Bucktooth... |
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again, and with no warning... again... breaking all gopher moles |
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(CGIs)... again. Sdf.org still uses gophernicus, however, which is |
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kind of confusing, especially if you read the gopher tutorial and |
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setup a CGI like it describes there, only to have it fail when your |
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phlog gets listed on gopher.club. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Books vs. E-books +++ |
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Sunday, September 16, 2018 |
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My wife and I had a discussion about books the other day. She is |
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reading a large hardcover, a book she got from English section of |
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the local library. She mentioned how much better she likes reading |
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actual books. I agreed, but it got me to thinking why I actually |
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feel this way. E-readers do have advantages, but something is |
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missing that makes reading from an e-reader seem less than |
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appealing. I think it is that e-books are sterile, they don't |
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provide the same sensory experience as real books. With a real book |
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you have the feel of the pages as you turn them. The visible |
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feedback as to just how much of the book you have read, as measured |
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by the thickness of the pages remaining. The smell of the book |
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itself. The ease with which you can hold it while reclining on your |
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couch. Flipping back a few pages to remember a character's name or |
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plot point while keeping your current position secure with a |
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finger. All combine to make a complete experience that e-readers |
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cannot match. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Reading List: Ken Follett +++ |
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Wednesday, August 29, 2018 |
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I just finished reading a very good book, 'Eye of the Needle' by Ken |
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Follett. It's a thriller set in WWII England, about the hunt for a |
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German spy. Very compelling reading, Follett is a great |
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writer. Mostly character-driven, but somehow he keeps you wanting |
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to turn the page. If you like historical fiction in particular |
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you'll enjoy it. I read another of his books recently, 'Pillars of |
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the Earth', which was equally engrossing, set in the early |
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middle-ages. There is a sequel to that latter one which is on my |
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"to-read" list. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Positive Changes at SDF +++ |
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Saturday, August 18, 2018 |
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I've been away from SDF for a bit, but I caught up on bboard today |
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and notice signs of increased responsiveness from the 'membership' |
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account. It seems to be replying to each and every requests thread, |
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and a lot of the helpdesk ones as well. I see more frequent emails |
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on new features, some like ssh-over-https that were requested by |
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users with a fairly quick turnaround time in implementation. I'm not |
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sure if this is smj or a group of admins (more likely the latter), |
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but the attention is welcome and long overdue. Thanks SDF! |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Home Ownership +++ |
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Tuesday, July 31, 2018 |
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We've been looking into buying a house recently, two years after we |
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sold our house in the US. We've been renting a house in Canada ever |
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since, and I kind of like it. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Reply to Tfurrows on Canada +++ |
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Friday, July 27, 2018 |
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Tfurrows ruminates on Canadian citizenship for himself and his kids |
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[0]. This is exactly the situation I was in - born prior to 2009, to |
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|
a Canadian father outside of Canada. I was easily able to reclaim my |
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Canadian citizenship. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Congrats to Tomasino +++ |
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|
Thursday, July 26, 2018 |
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Congrats to Tomasino on getting his Italian citizenship [0], and |
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|
welcome to the US expat club [1]! I have never been to Iceland, but |
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|
have always wanted to visit, I think it would be a wonderful place |
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|
to settle. Moving to another country is quite an ordeal, but well |
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|
worth it. I hope it all works out for you! |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ I'm not Surprised +++ |
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|
Tuesday, June 12, 2018 |
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I'm not surprised [0], the web has been a mess for some time, but |
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|
it's really, painfully bad as of 2018. The wholesale move to |
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|
client-side, dynamic page generation is partly to blame. And for |
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|
what purpose? Client-side designs are harder to test, and more |
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|
brittle as far as dealing with odd browser dependencies. They are |
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|
also slower than generating content directly on the server-side, |
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|
when you consider that the content still has to come from the |
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|
server, except now it is coming from dozens of RPCs (add up the |
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|
network overhead of each request). Let's not forget all the |
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|
javascript loaded from third-party websites used for tracking and |
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|
ads, these slow down the sites even more. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ CLI Translation Utility +++ |
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|
Sunday, June 10, 2018 |
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|
I came across a great command line translation utility 'translate |
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|
shell' [0]. It provides a script 'trans', which is written in pure |
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|
bash and gives an interface to the most popular online translation |
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|
sites (by default it will use Google translate). Here is an example |
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|
of it translating one of my recent French phosts [1]. The |
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|
translation is pretty accurate, at least enough to convey the |
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|
|
meaning. It has loads of options and I could see it being used to |
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|
facilitate a gopher-based translation site. |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Finally Spring +++ |
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|
Saturday, May 12, 2018 |
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|
It appears spring has finally arrived in Québec, after a bout of |
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|
unseasonably cold weather. My walks are more pleasant now, with the |
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|
trees budding and things coming to life in general. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Android Gopher Client +++ |
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|
Thursday, May 03, 2018 |
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|
I came across a new Android gopher client called 'DiggieDog' |
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|
[0]. Nothing outstanding, but it works fine as a basic client and |
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|
even has bookmark support. It has the usual issues with garbled |
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|
display of ascii-art and line wrap, but I'm not sure it's possible |
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|
to fix those in all cases in the mobile format. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ On Losing Weight +++ |
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|
Monday, April 02, 2018 |
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|
Txminth talks about his diet [0] - congrats on losing that weight! |
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|
I, too have been following the "hacker's diet" recently and counting |
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|
calories. My target is 1800 per day with a brisk walk most days |
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|
(five days a week). I've lost six pounds in two weeks. I have been |
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|
doing the walks for about two years, but my weight always held |
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|
steady until now. Counting calories really makes you aware of how |
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|
much you are eating. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Responses on Attention and Atheism +++ |
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|
Monday, April 02, 2018 |
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|
Solderpunk shared a link to an article on getting your attention |
|
|
|
back [0], I agree it was not very insightful. But it made me think |
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|
|
of how digital books can sometimes impact attention negatively, at |
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|
least for me. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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+++ Skiing and a Gopher Mirror +++ |
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|
Sunday, March 18, 2018 |
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|
We're having a snowy and cold March here in Quebec, but the clouds |
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|
|
broke today and it was sunny and -8. It turned out to be a perfect |
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|
|
day for some cross-country skiing - my wife and I got in 8km this |
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|
|
afternoon. The conditions were phenomenal, with minimal wind, nice, |
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|
cold snow (the kind that makes that satisfying hard scrape as your |
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|
|
skis travel over it) and no ice to speak of. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Remembering Prepping +++ |
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|
Wednesday, March 14, 2018 |
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|
Reading Melton's phlog [0] has made me miss my own experiments in |
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|
self-sufficiency and preparedness. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Resp. to Tomasino and Jynx +++ |
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|
Sunday, March 11, 2018 |
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|
|
Tomasino moved his gopher hole away from SDF [0], it's now |
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|
|
self-hosted on a RPi. He cites the recent stealth changes to SDF's |
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|
|
gopher implementation as his main reason for moving. |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Emacs and Remote Editing +++ |
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|
|
Thursday, March 08, 2018 |
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|
|
I've been working from the Meta-array (MA) lately since I'm finding |
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|
|
it a bit more responsive as far as editing and saving |
|
|
|
documents. That probably has to do with the heavy use of the cluster |
|
|
|
and that fact that you're always working over an NFS mount (although |
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|
|
I must say it's better lately on NetBSD 8.0 beta). |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Text Formatting and Emacs +++ |
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|
|
Wednesday, March 07, 2018 |
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|
|
There have been lots of interesting posts lately about text |
|
|
|
formatting tools [0][1][2][3][4] (I particularly like the artistic |
|
|
|
bent of jynx's and cat's posts with the embedded ascii art). Since |
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|
|
I'm an Emacs guy I've used muse mode in the past - this is what I |
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|
|
wrote the SDF Emacs tutorial and cheatsheet in. For that they were |
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|
|
invaluable since I had one source document and could generate HTML, |
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|
|
text, and epub [5]. Speaking of formatting, in Emacs there is a |
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|
|
minor mode called refill-mode, it auto-fills paragraphs as you type, |
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|
|
with whatever justification you set ('M-x set-justification-full' is |
|
|
|
what I'm using for this post). You can also disable refill-mode and |
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|
|
just manually fill paragraphs with M-q every so often. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Response to Solderpunk +++ |
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|
|
Thursday, February 22, 2018 |
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|
Just a quick reply to solderpunk, I would indeed be interested in an |
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|
|
80s-themed hotel room [0]. Genius! Alas, I agree modern (wo-)man |
|
|
|
would be intent on just taking selfies with console TVs and princess |
|
|
|
phones. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Woodnotes Guides on Gopher +++ |
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|
|
Monday, February 19, 2018 |
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|
I love finding new gopher sites. I posted a link to the classic |
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|
|
'Woodnotes Guide to Mutt' [0] in bboard today. After perusing the |
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|
|
author's blog, I discovered he uses gopher [1], and his site is |
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|
|
mirrored there, including all his tech guides [2]. |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ I Miss the 80s +++ |
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|
Friday, February 16, 2018 |
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|
With apologies to my younger readers. |
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Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Long Live Bongusta +++ |
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|
|
Thursday, February 08, 2018 |
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|
|
Just a quick note to thank Logout for Bongusta [0] and for keeping |
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|
|
it around [1]. I use it every day and I'm sure others do as well. |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Thoughts on Finding Recently Updated SDF Gopherholes +++ |
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|
|
Saturday, February 03, 2018 |
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|
|
I and some others have noticed some issues recently with the SDF |
|
|
|
phlogosphere display [0] and the sort order. So you know the |
|
|
|
history, way back in 2009, smj posted this to the GOPHER bboard: |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Long-Ass Gophermaps +++ |
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|
|
Wednesday, January 31, 2018 |
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|
|
Regarding Solderpunk's gopher bboard reply, on overly long |
|
|
|
gophermaps and how VF-1 does not handle them with a pager: |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ The VF-1 Gopher Client +++ |
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|
|
Monday, January 22, 2018 |
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|
|
So I took some time today to put solderpunk's new gopher client VF-1 |
|
|
|
[0][1] through its paces. I'm using whatever version is currently |
|
|
|
installed on SDF. First let me say that I love the interface design, |
|
|
|
despite it being quite different from lynx and gopher I got used to |
|
|
|
it pretty quickly (as in a few minutes). I think anyone with REPL |
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|
|
experience will feel at home with it. The search facility and |
|
|
|
veronica commands are very useful. I particularly like the |
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|
|
auto-generation of menus after each operation, whether that be a |
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|
|
search or link extraction (and that last is quite handy). |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Pale Blue Dot +++ |
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|
|
Tuesday, January 16, 2018 |
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|
|
I've been keeping a low profile lately as post-holiday work has been |
|
|
|
a bear and I've not had the motivation to write. But I'm catching up |
|
|
|
on things today and saw a phost by gunnarfrost that caught my eye |
|
|
|
[0]. He mentions the view of earth from space and how this has |
|
|
|
shaped our philosophical views of the meaning of life. This made me |
|
|
|
think of Carl Sagan's the 'Pale Blue Dot' [1][2], which is about the |
|
|
|
view of Earth from Voyager I, seen as a tiny speck from about six |
|
|
|
million kilometers away. Here is the quote: |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Thoughts on Pseudo-anonymity +++ |
|
|
|
Tuesday, January 02, 2018 |
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|
|
Solderpunk talks about pseudonymity [0] and the issues surrounding |
|
|
|
it. Thankfully I do not recall ever reading that bit of bad advice |
|
|
|
by Eric Raymond. |
|
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |
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|
+++ Welcome 2018 +++ |
|
|
|
Monday, January 01, 2018 |
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|
|
Welcome to the new year, fellow gopherites! I notice some phloggers |
|
|
|
have archived their 2017 posts into a sub-folder, with an apology |
|
|
|
for breaking links. I see the most impact to that will be in the |
|
|
|
'reply' posts where we link to one another, although the naming |
|
|
|
convention from here on out should prevent that (phlog/ -> |
|
|
|
phlog/2017/, for example). When I thought about archiving my posts, |
|
|
|
I realized this a good reason to use gophermaps for a phlog - that |
|
|
|
one layer of abstraction above raw directory indexes allows one to |
|
|
|
archive posts transparently. In my case, I only needed to copy the |
|
|
|
2017 posts into an empty subfolder, with their gophermap: |
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|
Continued... |
text/plain |