Friday, July 26, 2024

Friday Links 24-22

Library with seating area in front

This week, I can recommend the long read about the Stream Deck, the one about books, and the discovery about a 55 year old bug in a game.

Last week, my automation for these failed, so you have to endure twice as many links today.

I also said that I wouldn't post depressing news any more. I am sorry, but the climate crisis and pollution made me do it, so it is your fault really.

Leadership

Gossip, Rumors, and Lies - About staff meetings.

3 reasons to stop hating one-on-one meetings - "After all, what’s a manager’s job? To get results and to grow people."

Developing domain expertise: get your hands dirty. - interesting approaches for different companies. Using the product, and shadowing customer support, seem to be good approaches. 

No More Mandatory - "By making something mandatory, you’re taking a rip at my autonomy."

The SECRET To Improve Developer Productivity Is... Being HAPPY?  [YouTube] - surprise! The mentioning of The Mythical Man-Month was unexpected. "Job satisfaction is the no.1 predictor of organizational performance"

Work

The Data Is In: Return-to-Office Mandates Aren’t Worth the Talent Risks - I see many advantages of offices, but this is the one you should care about.

Engineering

Open Source AI Is the Path Forward - is it really open source?

Switzerland now requires all government software to be open source - the real open source. "public money, public code"

How to use the new counted_by attribute in C (and Linux) - you look away for a decade and everything changes. This appears to be quite useful for safety. 

How I Found A 55 Year Old Bug In The First Lunar Lander Game - nice detective work.

Environment 

Urban air pollution and time losses: Evidence from cyclists in London [Paper] - increase in pollution reduces cycling speed. Or: clean cities to go (a bit) faster.

Kew Gardens prepares for climate change tree loss - this is a well-maintained park, now think about all the trees.

PFAS widely added to US pesticides despite EPA denial, study finds - thank you, America!

Sick leaves: tea growers’ climate misery leads to jump in UK prices - this should mobilise the Brits, right? 

Ireland’s datacentres overtake electricity use of all urban homes combined - thank you, Ireland!

Sunday was world’s hottest ever recorded day, data suggests - some of these links could be related. 

Five protesters and one police officer hurt in French reservoir demonstration - the water wars part #113.

Data centers draining resources in water-stressed communities - "Data centers are not a renewable resource."

The band that doesn't want you to drive to their concerts - artists who care about sustainability. 

Microsoft and Google's electricity consumption surpasses the power usage of over 100 countries - no comment.

Urbanism

The Problem with Cities & The Urban Doom Loop Could Still Happen

"To truly recover, cities must diversify their economic base, streamline the construction and conversion of new housing and mixed-use neighborhoods, enhance public services, and double down on what makes urban life attractive in its own right — not just as an employment destination."

Putting design first: six social housing projects from around the world - annoyingly, Denmark is doing it the best again. 

BikeBus Summit ‘24 - all a bit different, all good. 

Cycling your commute can lower risk of death by 47%, as long as you aren't hit by a driver - roll the dice.

Stuttgart's Urban Rack Railway [YouTube] - if you like trams & co.

The qualities of a great bike city aren't what I expected [YouTube] - cities with higher density help, so do politics and vibes. 

Carspiracy - You’ll Never See The World The Same Way Again [YouTube] - sadly, GCN is preaching to the choir.

Random Books

No one buys books - and most books don't earn anything.

Decoding Gen-Z slang and grammar pet peeves with linguist Anne Curzan [Podcast] - I am going to start using "a couple" as meaning "a few" again! Who is with me? 

The Famous Computer Cafe 1985-07-12 Joel Berez (Infocom) and Jack Anderson (Young Astronauts) [Podcast] - a bit about Infocom. 

VNC Resolver - peek into someone's VNC.

'Not harmful to health': Korea's Buldak spicy noodles return to shelves as Denmark reverses recall  - Koreans are still wondering what is going on. 

'Superlubricious' coating radically drops friction between metal parts - is it just me, or is everybody thinking bicycle gears? 

Scared [Comic] - trust the pros. 

[Essay] The Breaking of a Social Contract, or Why I am Switching to Copyleft Licensing - good thinking about the decision. 

Munich, home of the Oktoberfest, to open alcohol-free beer garden - "noting that while there were patrons who could drink 10 beers in a night, few would order 10 fruit juices." someone tell them about non-alcoholic beer. 

How the Stream Deck rose from the ashes of a legendary keyboard - cool story.

Hackers Steal Text and Call Records of ‘Nearly All’ AT&T Customers - snowflake leak.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, July 12, 2024

Friday Links 24-21

Octopus in aquarium
Good news for the environment. 

I enjoyed reading the PySkyWiFi hack! This happens when engineers are bored.

Engineering

Just Use Postgres for Everything - I have opinions …

PySkyWiFi: completely free, unbelievably stupid wi-fi on long-haul flights - how many programmers have thought about hacking the Wi-Fi in planes? All of them! 

Microservices [YouTube] - funny, also use better names for your stuff!

PagerDuty Incident Response - looking at this at the moment..

Work

A growing body of data is debunking myths about remote work

Environment 

Amazon meets 100% renewable energy goal 7 years early - maybe Google should take notice.

Energy boss backs lower bills for those near wind farms - that's a good way of spreading them. Germany does this badly.

Labour lifts Tories’ ‘absurd’ ban on onshore windfarms  - yay!

Urbanism 

Cities are failing women on bikes, but we can fix it  [YouTube] - you have to make it easy and safe for everyone.

Review of City-Wide 30 km/h Speed Limit Benefits in Europe  [Paper] - up to 38% reduction in road crashes, 18% less emissions

Random Octopuses

Is it Octopi or Octopuses? | Correct Plural of Octopus - both work, apparently.

The Famous Computer Cafe 1984-11-17 Bill Gates and Kazuhiko Nishi [Podcast] - early Gates and MSX.

Nike killing app for $350 self-tying sneakers - internet of sh*t.

Spanish town acting as 'rear guard' for charity boats rescuing migrants - nice

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, July 05, 2024

Friday Links 24-20

Vintage Atari ad: One word for these prices: Rip-off

This week I have been enjoying the audio archive of The Famous Computer Cafe, a radio show from the eighties with many famous guests of the home computer area. There are definitely some parallels to the present. 

The X Windows history is also great. 

Today's post does contain plenty of throwbacks.

Leadership

TBM 297: Staying In Touch - keeping track of things helps, people forget, and we can't see trends 

On Burnout, Mental Health, And Not Being Okay  - take care of yourself.

Engineering

X Window System At 40 - about the history, and why it is still around. 

Serious vulnerability fixed with OpenSSH 9.8 - seems to be difficult to exploit, but possible.

Environment 

‘It needs to stay in the loop’: German reuse schemes turn shopping upside down - some of this is happening in Spain too. 

Our 2024 Environmental Report - from Google, pretending everything is fine 

Google’s emissions climb nearly 50% in five years due to AI energy demand - it's not fine.

Heatpumpmonitor - database with ratings. 

World’s largest plane to carry wind turbines and save Earth - I don't even understand if this makes sense.

Understanding the large role of long-distance travel in carbon emissions from passenger travel [Paper] - turns out long-distance travel is increasing and also especially bad for the environment. 

‘We can’t let the animals die’: drought leaves Sicilian farmers facing uncertain future - maybe everybody has to migrate north.

Urbanism

In this satirical city builder, your goal is to convert walkable cities into parking lots and use propaganda to convince everyone it's what they want - too real!

The REAL reason America can’t go Dutch [YouTube] - because they don't dare to do it. 

Read this at my funeral - all cyclists know how they die ... most likely die anyway.

Random Home Computers

The Famous Computer Cafe 1985-02-08 James Copland [Podcast] - I have been going through the backlog of these radio recordings. They are all fun, even the commercials. This one is about Atari.

The Famous Computer Cafe 1984-12-21 Douglas Adams and Steve Meretzky [Podcast] - Douglas Adams talking about the Infocom HHGG text adventure.

Fiio’s reboot of the Walkman no longer hides those glorious cassettes - I am pretty sure the quality will be bad. I might still get one. 

Sony Walkman Turns 45  - not much of an article ... but yeah!

German cannabis clubs face jungle of bureaucracy - who is surprised? 

The Circle Back Initiative - interesting initiative to make sure companies get back to you when you apply for a job.

Here is your demo version of Energize for Solaris - those are some pretty CDs!

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kind of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time you might notice common themes though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, June 28, 2024

Friday Links 24-19

Philips D8444 stereo radio recorder (boombox, ghettoblaster)
Clearing up my backlog again!

A lot of fun stuff in the random section. I did enjoy the podcast about getting or not getting into Berghain, and the one about the Stereophonic play.
The ongoing research into the XZ backdoor also continues to be interesting.

Leadership 

Seven Conversation Hacks - some of this is harder, when working remote.

The route to better culture? Better managers - mostly quoting research.

The State of Teams - Atlassian data.

TBM 295: Going Deep  - "There is a thoughtful way to connect with your team, mentor, and coach and give useful feedback. It takes time and energy. By all means, be good managers."

Sharing Our Latest Culture Memo - from Netflix - "People over Process: Our goal is to inspire and empower more than manage because employees have more impact when they’re free to make decisions about their own work." 

Engineering

XZ backdoor: Hook analysis - more analysis on how that attack was supposed to work. 

The Trough of Despair - it will get worse, before it gets better. 

Urbanism / Transport

Germany's autobahn bridges falling apart - here is an idea: if you can't maintain your infrastructure, try building less

Is it even a city? [YouTube] - "Everything is just so … available"

What is the future of Barcelona’s Superblocks? - model for other cities, fighting for survival in Barcelona. 

I Rode the Craziest Trains in Japan [YouTube] - I'll take the bicycle train, please.

Lebensadern für Velofahrerinnen [German] - Utrecht's way to a better city. 

Environment 

Why is defending forests so deadly? [Podcast] - first I thought this was about South America, but this is in Europe!

How Spain's tourism industry is dealing with drought - not well! 

‘Whack-a-mole situation’: Algerian officials wrestle with water shortage anger - the water wars are coming! 

BHP rejects hydrogen and hybrids, will go straight to electric for giant haul trucks - meanwhile some politicians continue to sell us hydrogen as the future. 

Solar modules deployed in France in 1992 still provide 79.5% of original output power - as batteries, they last longer than expected. 

Too much of a good thing? Spain's green energy can exceed demand - we need more electric consumers (cars, factories, ...)

Random Boomboxes

Sharp's Back-to-Back Boombox mixtape madness [YouTube] - should I have a separate cassette section every week? Better not. 

Tape Player/Recorder Diy - Final Circuit and Demo [YouTube] - building a tape head from scratch.

The disturbing online misogyny of Gamergate has returned – if it ever went away - some gamers are weird.

How I Stopped Fearing Boredom [Podcast] - boredom is the best! Or just call it the slack between the busy times. 

Overnight Success: How the founders of Kona Bikes saved their company [Podcast] - sounds like a bunch of hippies … nice.

592. How to Make the Coolest Show on Broadway [Podcast] - I am not a fan of plays or musicals, but this sounds intriguing. I did like the Fleetwood Mac documentary.

Why didn’t Chris and Dan get into Berghain? (Part 1)  & Why didn’t Chris and Dan get into Berghain? (Part 2) [Podcast] - I don't get the hype about Berghain. This is well told and funny. 

Falling Sand - want to waste some time, here you go …

SANDTRIS - you have more time, here you go …

How TED talks became the Picotop of millennial intellectualism - I noticed that I haven't seen any TED talks in a long time.

‘Thought Leader’ gives talk that will inspire your thoughts | CBC Radio (Comedy/Satire Skit) [YouTube] - and now that I have seen this, I can never unsee it for future TED talks.

Style Different Fonts [Instagram Reel] - quite fun for font fans.

Other Links

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, June 14, 2024

Friday Links 24-18

Polaroid photo and camera
I really love the photograph series in the random section, it is a great concept.

The videos about the busiest train station and buying a train are also great … if you like trains.

Leadership

Beyond 'Sorry': How to Apologize and Mean It 6 | 22  [Podcast] - most apologies are just deflections.

TBM 293: Where More Effective Product Teams Spend More (and Less) Time - "Navigating proxies" - good collection!

Engineering

Story: From Burnout to Breakthrough  [Podcast] - I didn't know about Hedy before, it sounds quite interesting. The origin story is well told.

Regexle - who doesn't like regexes? 

The Documentation Tradeoff - "Nobody _wants_ documentation. They want to know enough to change the code quickly"

New York Times source code stolen using exposed GitHub token - oops!

Environment

Whose Truth?: Climate change denial  [Podcast] - part of a BBC series about misinformation.

Swiss parliament defies ECHR on climate women's case - Swiss being Swiss.

Urbanism

Galway City produces local version graphic showing space used by transport modes

I Visited the World's Busiest Train Station [YouTube] - three million!

Rushing to McDonald’s, sneaking into Trump Tower: the desperate struggle to find a public toilet in New York - a problem in most cities. 

Decoding the 15-Minute City Debate: Conspiracies, Backlash, and Dissent in Planning for Proximity - conspiracies are always weird, but this one is the weirdest.

Random Photographs

A Black photographer added himself to places where history didn’t want him - so cool.

591. Signs of Progress, One Year at a Time  [Podcast] - fun stories, some I knew already.

Whose Truth?: Russia v Ukraine [Podcast] - another episode in this series

Death from the Skies, Musk Edition - filling the sky with satellites and the ground with rubbish.

Will a personality test cost you your dream job? - "workplace horoscopes"

I Got My Own Train [YouTube] - everyone's dream.

It’s another Guardian Blind date wedding! How a lockdown love story ended in ‘I do’ - yes, I am a sucker for Guardian's blind dates, and especially the successful ones.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, June 07, 2024

Friday Links 24-17

Book cover: Commodore Amiga a visual Commpendium

The leadership antipatterns are quite good, so is the video about a new development in Amsterdam.

Leadership

Product Coaching with Petra Wille  [Podcast] - coaching not agile coaches.

Briefly: Anonymous Questions - how to set up Q&As as a leader

Unexpected Anti-Patterns for Engineering Leaders — Lessons From Stripe, Uber & Carta - #3 being a shit-umbrella 

Engineering 

What to Know Before You Implement Public-Facing APIs - I still think versioning APIs is overrated.

Sharing details on a recent incident impacting one of our customers - "we left auto-delete on"

Work

A year on, Spain’s ‘historic’ menstrual leave law has hardly been used. Why? - unsurprising, I hope this will improve.

Offsites, huh - the bigger you are, the harder they will be

Urbanism

Mayor fined €100 for riding on street where cycling is banned by the council, while shooting ‘cycle to work’ video to encourage cycling in Barcelona - I never realised there were roads like this in Barcelona ... you never stop learning things you don't want to know.

The $1.8 Billion Plan for Amsterdam [YouTube] - bloody Amsterdam, making everything so nice!

Are the Suburbs Getting Worse?* [YouTube] - yes, in the US

Random Amigas

AmigaPCI - a new Amiga compatible board based on PCI

New Electronics Workshop Tour [YouTube] - I don't understand all the toys, but I want them.

interviewcopilot - I expect some fun future interviews!

On Fire Drills and Phishing Tests - I had an article about this last week, this is the original "You can’t “fix” people, but you can fix the tools."

Drum N Bass in CommonLisp  [YouTube] - groovy 

Spain fines budget airlines €150m over ‘abusive’ cabin bag and seat charges - I am boycotting Ryanair, but the others are pretty bad too.

Other Links

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, May 31, 2024

Friday Links 24-16

Alice in Wonderland themed tea mug with writing "Drink me"
This week, the "City in A Bottle" JavaScript demo blew me away. 

The podcasts in the leadership section are also pretty good. 

Leadership

Albert Strasheim, CTO at Rippling, on Embracing Rapid Iteration and Setting Goals for Accountability [Podcast] - interesting ideas about project management and also insights into our competition.

A company is not a family with Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky [Podcast] - I didn't know the origin of the name! I also think that overcommunication is a good thing. I am working on that. 

How Can I Set the Right Boundaries in a New Job? [Podcast] - another great coaching session.

Engineering 

Why, after 6 years, I’m over GraphQL - I have always been sceptical.

Environment

What does China's green tech revolution mean for the world? [Podcast] - for some reason, they focus on the negative.

What are PFAs? Everything you need to know about the ‘forever chemicals’ surrounding us every day - we are all plastic!

Random Tea

For seven years, I have been caffeine-free. Here’s how it has changed me - I can't remember when I stopped, probably around that time.

Remembering ICQ: A Page Out of History - I don't have that rosy memories. I am from the IRC generation.

Heura Launches Plant-Based Butcher’s - I really like Heura's products. This is a gimmicky way of marketing products.

City In A Bottle – A 256 Byte Raycasting System - this is just remarkable.

The Space Quest II Master Disk Blunder - oops.

Google: Stop Trying to Trick Employees With Fake Phishing Emails - I am not a big fan of tricking employees either.

The greatest clock (and map) ever made [YouTube] - definitely not the greatest. Pretty good, though.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, May 24, 2024

Friday Links 24-15

Mocktail on a dark table
This week I enjoyed the podcast with Vitaly Pecherskiy, and the one about improv and presence. 

If you like alcohol-free cocktails, the article from The Guardian has a good list, with some weird tricks, like clarifying coconut milk.

Leadership

Vitaly Pecherskiy, Co-Founder at StackAdapt, on the Role of the CEO, Mental Models, and Employee Onboarding [Podcast] - I liked the insights about leadership composition and constantly improving yourself. 

Presence: 'Yes and...' - how the secrets of improv can teach us about work [Podcast] - some interesting ideas between all the self-promotion.

Beyond the Bias: The Truth About Remote Work vs. Returning to the Office [Podcast] - Co-founder of product for remote "goes beyond the bias" … right. 

Leadership, Decision Making, Work-Life Balance, and Everything in Between with Kendall Miller [Podcast] - Kendall about everything.

Making engineering strategies more readable - nice tips.

These People Aren’t Gods: How European Founders Can Stop Making The #1 Mistake in US Recruiting  - "What happens when a culture of understated accomplishment meets a culture of overstated achievement?"

Engineering

Never, Ever, Ever Use Pixelation for Redacting Text  - The Unredacter!

Environment 

Alarm as German climate activists charged with ‘forming a criminal organisation’ - similar development to the UK. 

Toxic Gaslighting: How 3M Executives Convinced a Scientist the Forever Chemicals She Found in Human Blood Were Safe - it is always the same, the polluters know before the rest of us.

Urbanism

How did Helsinki make transit work in the suburbs? | Navigating Urban Transit with George Liu [YouTube] - those are some fancy bus / metro terminals. 

“Pure bile and prejudice”: Cyclists slam local government’s proposal to introduce “mandatory bike insurance” and urging cyclists to “encourage overtaking” in Spanish city - it is the usual anti cycling policies of some cities. This is not far from Barcelona. 

Random Drinks

The experts: bartenders on how to turn 16 classic cocktails into mocktails – from a negroni to a mojito - nice ideas for all us teetotals.

Specialized SL8 Index: How Long Does It Take to Afford S-Works SL8 Around the World? - it is a toy for the rich. 

The KeePassXC kerfuffle [LWN] - I think I have disabled most of these options.

An exercise in frustration - more fun with AI image generators. 

1152. Waro Kishi /// Kim House /// Ikuno Ward, Osaka, Japan /// 1986-87 - I like these small houses more than the usual villas on the site.

Other Links 

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, May 17, 2024

Friday Links 24-14

A collection of vinyl single records

This week's recommendation is everything in Urbanism. It's all about improving cities. Two podcasts and one YouTube video.

Leadership

Wisdom for Work #23 - Cultivating Conditions of Courage [Podcast] - how to lead with honesty and foster psychological safety 

Sociotechnical Maestros with Gene Kim [Podcast] - I am not a big fan of most of Gene Kim's books, but this interview is pretty good.

Five Tips to be Happier at Work (Dr Laurie at SXSW) [Podcast] - why do you want happier employees? Because they are more productive.

Urbanism

Can we build better cities for mental health and the climate? [Podcast] - we could if we wanted.

Some Business Owners REALLY Hate Bike Lanes (with Bike Curious) [Podcast] - you just can't use logic with them.

What is the "Correct" Speed Limit? [YouTube] - it's 30 km/h

Random Records

"I was probably off my head... it wasn't meant to be a novelty record, it was meant to be an underground record": The story of The Prodigy’s cartoon-sampling rave hit Charly - from 1991!

Reimagining technology – and talking to animals – with Aza Raskin [Podcast] - using AI to talk to animals, and what that could mean for us.

Stop Trying To Defeat Racism With Logic - the announcement of the new Assassin's Creed game led to the expected racist backlash.

Why clubbers are raving about Germany’s cross-country Techno Train - a round trip is a bit boring

BreakTime - kill the meetings!

Most common 4 digit PINs - mine are also on the bottom left.

Other Links

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, May 03, 2024

Friday Links 24-13

Eurobeat 2000 club flyer

This week I enjoyed the interviews with Hazel Weakley and Melinda French Gates.

For some reason, I also have a few clubbing related links. If you like electronic music and play around with it yourself, I recommend the podcast with Alex McLean about live coding.

Leadership

Software Development As Collective Learning With Hazel Weakly [Podcast] - Very thoughtful interview about Hazels journey and her views on leadership.

TBM 274: How Capable Leaders Navigate Uncertainty and Ambiguity - this was mentioned in the podcast above. Prompts and example interview questions. 

Constraints on giving feedback. - how to think about feedback.

A Software Engineering Career Ladder - another one!

The Power of Rituals at Work 6 | 16 [Podcast] - he clearly has a book to sell. 

Presence: Presence starts with positive leadership [Podcast] - another book to sell? Presence doesn't have to be in person.

Engineering 

PHP from 2014 to 2024 [YouTube] - it has been a while since I last worked with PHP. I still think it is underrated and one of the languages that is developing the fastest and with a great ecosystem.

With Backstage, Spotify’s getting serious about its enterprise and dev tools business play - I still haven't seen this in action. It seems to be mostly focused on organisations with many services.

VASA-1: Lifelike Audio-Driven Talking Faces - scary … but also: rapping Mona Lisa!

OMG! We’re at forty! (Announcing the release of Fedora Linux 40) - I can't believe it has been 20 years since I complained about the switch from RHL to FC.

Environment 

Europe baked in ‘extreme heat stress’ pushing temperatures to record highs - the summer will be fun.

Ocean spray emits more PFAS than industrial polluters, study finds - it's not the ocean's fault!

Urbanism

‘Urination equality’: Amsterdam women win fight for more public toilets - we just need more public toilets for all genders.

Is Europe Sprawling? [YouTube] - yes, but not if compared to the US.

How to Remove a Highway [YouTube] - nice.

Lawmakers to allow NYC to lower speed limit to 20 mph - Germany started this idea, and now it is lacking behind.

Random Flyers

george georgiou clubart - flyers and clubart.

Wherein the Millennial influencers weigh in on staying until last call - I can relate. 

“I'm almost ashamed to be known as a DJ”: Dave Clarke on the state of dance music and the making of Archive One

The magic of ALGORAVE: Why We Bleep podcast with Alex McLean [YouTube] - Alex talking about live coding, Tidal Cycles, and Strudel.

8. Melinda French Gates [Podcast] - I just discovered this podcast now. It is great to have Kirsty Young back. She is such a great host.

The Millennial CAPTCHA - fun. I qualify, apparently. 

Teslarossa Ep10 - 2000 mile road trip [YouTube] - I want an electric classic car, but something more practical. French rest stops are also the best.

The Fifth Floor: My emergency kit list [Podcast] - I have been looking into this since last year. The forest fires are coming closer.

‘In the US they think we’re communists!’ The 70,000 workers showing the world another way to earn a living - maybe I have to get an Orbea after all.

Five of Europe’s best national parks – with all the beauty but none of the crowds - I have been only to two of these.

podcastindex - nice initiative.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, April 19, 2024

Friday Links 24-12

fibre network distribution boxes with cables on a wall
Both leadership podcasts about managers and coaching are excellent. 

The post about remote work is also interesting. People are different, so are organisations.

Leadership

The future of work? "The manager as a therapist" [Podcast] - I think I used that line before. I am not sure if this is a good thing.

Extras #24 - Building High-Performing Teams Through Coaching - with Steph Yiu [Podcast] - interesting stuff from Automatic. I would love to see that kind of support in all companies. 

The remoteness of remote work - well-balanced and personal view on a companies remote work phases. 

Principal Engineer - according to this, mainly about business skills.

Engineering

Docs as code is a broken promise - I agree. Writing stuff should be as easy as possible. Workflows for code are not optimised for that.

Environment 

How Swiss women won a landmark climate case for Europe [Podcast] - The Guardian

The biggest climate case that ever was [Podcast] - The Europeans

Why are electric scooters, mopeds and rickshaws booming? [Podcast] - because they are better.

Snow in Peril: The Impact of Climate Change on Ski Resorts in the Pyrenees - the Grandvalira marketing speaks of a 5% sales loss. They are probably optimistic.

Urbanism

Does tiny living impact wellbeing? - apparently not!

After 30 years, Critical Mass is still fighting for cyclists on London’s roads - if you can, join one in your city!

Technology can save you from red light runners - I would argue tech could help with many things drivers do wrong.

Random Networks

The Rise And Fall Of The LAN Party - I missed that part. It started with not networked home computers and didn't do computers in the high of the LAN parties. Looks cool. 

Hidden 3D Pictures - finally some "hidden" pictures that are easy to see. 

Can You 3D Print Cassettes? [YouTube] - yes, just the case. 

@countleaves - play text adventures on Mastodon - currently HHGG

Abortions in first 12 weeks should be legalised in Germany, commission says - I didn't realise that abortion was illegal in Germany. There are numerous exceptions to make it accessible to most people.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, April 12, 2024

Friday Links 24-11

Amiga Kickstart boot screen

Some cheerful urbanism news this week. It is especially great to see how Paris is progressing.

For a fun nerdy read, have a look at the tic-tac-toe implemented in printf, or the floppy history.

Engineering 

How to measure your cloud carbon footprint [Podcast] - nice open-source tool.

Backdoor in XZ Utils That Almost Happened - Schneier weighs in too.

The Turing Police say "X Wins"  - tic-tac-toe implemented in a single printf. 

Notes on how to use LLMs in your product. - as always, a good summary from Will.

Environment

Taylor Swift's Two Private Jets in 2023: Where Did They Go? [YouTube] - two? 

Tenth consecutive monthly heat record alarms and confounds climate scientists - this really isn't news any more. 

Human rights violated by Swiss inaction on climate, ECHR rules in landmark case - go KlimaSeniorinnen!

TIL: Most Teabags contain plastics, and release micro plastics in large amounts when brewed - I am now 2% plastic.

Urbanism

End of the Line? Saudi Arabia ‘forced to scale back’ plans for desert megacity - nobody really believed this would happen? Do cities created by rich people ever work?

How do the dolmuÅŸ and minibus systems work in Istanbul? | With Geert Kloppenburg  [YouTube] - one way of having flexible public transport. 

Spain to end 'golden visas' granting residency to investors who spend €500k on housing - it was not widely used, but it is good that they stop it. 

French Revolution: Cyclists Now Outnumber Motorists In Paris - this was a pretty quick change overall. 

Campaigners hail “historic” EU cycling declaration - it remains to be seen if this changes anything.

Beyond Bike Lanes: What Really Impressed Us About Cycling in the Netherlands [YouTube] - the Netherlands are still showing the way.

Random Floppies

The Rise and Fall of 3M’s Floppy Disk - amazingly, I never had a computer with proper 5 1/4 floppy disks, only with 3 and later 3 1/2 disks.

583. Are We Living Through the Most Revolutionary Period in History? [Podcast] - mostly depressing. 

GNU Stow 2.4.0 released - I switched to using this for my dotfiles last year, and I just now learn that I know the maintainer. 

How to Build a Small Solar Power System - this goes straight to the to-do list.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.


Friday, April 05, 2024

Friday Links 24-10

Heisenberg's indeterminacy principle formula.

Two weeks of links, which includes a collection from the xz debacle. I loved reading these, as this is a good combination of spy story and technology postmortem. If you want to read an overview, read the timeline post. 

Good podcasts this week: about the Heisenberg principle, and the silencing of climate protesters in the UK. 

Leadership

Getting real with Employee Experience [Podcast] - two good interviews with people active in the area.

Mentorship, coaching, sponsorship: three different — and equally important — tools for developing talent - good summary of the three aspects of staff development.

How do we evaluate people for their technical leadership? - measuring knowledge work is hard.

Jack Shit - systems over work. 

Part 1: Burnout Is A Thousand Tiny Self-Betrayals - I first read it as victim blaming, but it is true that it is mostly in your hand.

Reflection: When was your team last together? - sadly, in a fully remote and distributed company, this is really hard. 

TBM 277: Bring Back Fun - “Having fun building stuff that has impact”

Engineering

xz backdoor

GNOME 46 puts Flatpaks front and center - I don't like it!

mini-announcement: I've decided to publish Yotta. - very cool minimalistic system.

AI is boring and stupid and maybe that's OK - "Sometimes boring and stupid is still really useful. "

What We Know We Don't Know [Talk] - "Nothing is real, we don’t understand what we’re doing, and the only way to write good software is to stop drinking coffee. Burn it all down. Burn it to the ground."

Environment 

The silencing of climate protesters in English and Welsh courts [Podcast] - is the UK becoming less democratic? I think this answers the question. 

Plant-heavy ‘flexitarian’ diets could help limit global heating, study finds - it is a lot easier to get people to become flexitarian than vegetarian or vegan. And the numbers make a difference.

Urbanism

Mobility Debate at COAC: What is Barcelona missing? - I agree with all of this, especially about the congestion charge and superblocks.

Random Uncertainty

Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle [Podcast] - another lovely episode from In Our Time.

We have a right to repair! (Interview) [Podcast] - history and challenges of iFixit. 

‘We can’t find a single German or European applicant’: Deeptech startups feel bite of talent shortage - Germany making progress difficult.

All billionaires under 30 have inherited their wealth, research finds - is anyone surprised?

Best printer 2024 - just get a brother laser printer

You Can Now Follow President Biden on the Fediverse - I am not on Threads, but now some accounts from there are arriving at Mastodon. 

Cannabis users celebrate relaxation of laws on personal use in Germany - finally! This will also change Europe.

EU investigates Apple, Meta and Google owner Alphabet under new tech law - the EU is doing good work in this space at the moment.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Thursday, April 04, 2024

Sharing a monitor between Linux & Mac

Desk with two monitors and laptop
For my new job, I (annoyingly) have to use a silly MacBook. For everything else, I have a nice, beautiful desktop running Fedora.

I looked into KVMs to share my monitor and keyboard between the two computers, but couldn't really find something reasonably priced and functional. 

Synergy/Barrier/InputLeap for keyboard sharing

I have used Synergy before to share keyboard and mouse between Linux computers, and this was already a good step. There is a fork for Synergy on Linux called Barrier, which now has been forked again to InputLeap. It also allows copy & paste between systems.

This brought me half to where I wanted to be, but I was still restricted to the tiny laptop screen on the Mac. 

DDC monitor input source switching

Both of my monitors are connected via DisplayPort to my desktop. I now connected the right monitor also via HDMI to the Mac. This already allowed me to easily switch between the input sources with the monitor's on-screen menu.

While researching a new monitor, which has a build in KVM, but only comes with software for Mac & Windows, I found out that you can control most monitor functionality via DCC. 

This includes things like brightness, contrast, rotation, and most importantly the input source. 

For Linux, you can use ddcutil and your window manager keyboard shortcut settings. For me, it is these two commands, your monitor and sources may vary.

ddcutil -d 1 setvcp 0x60 0x0f # display 1 -> displayport

ddcutil -d 1 setvcp 0x60 0x11 # display 1 -> hdmi

On OS X you can use BetterDisplay, this is a pretty nifty tool to control all kinds of aspects of your display, definitely worth a look. It also supports keyboard shortcuts to change input sources.

BetterDisplay screenshot

There you go, easy-peasy and for free. I hope that helps someone, or me in the future, when I forget how it works.


Friday, March 22, 2024

Friday Links 24-09

Painting with two radio masts in the country side

I loved the essay about 40 years of programming by Lars Wirzenius. 

The coaching session about career goals is also great, independent of the topic.

Leadership

How Do I Balance My Career Goals with My Company’s Needs? [Podcast] - great coaching session. 

Breaking Down Barriers: How Field Trips to Different Team Offsites Spark Cross-Team Collaboration - I love this idea. 

Leadership requires taking some risk. - "sometimes bottom-up leadership requires obfuscating the work being done"

Friction isn't velocity. - change creates friction (in the form of more work), and change feels good, even if the result might not be better.

Engineering

40 years of programming - good summary about engineering and leading projects (at the time of writing, there is an SSL error)

How to run an LLM on your PC, not in the cloud, in less than 10 minutes - I'll put that on my long to-do list. 

Code samples for the opening chapter of Refactoring - love this. It is missing Perl, Ruby, and Elixir, in case you are bored.

Urbanism

People Hate the Idea of Car-Free Cities—Until They Live in One - “If you go back a year or two later, people will just say: well, this is the best thing we ever did.”

Paris cycling numbers double in one year thanks to massive investment and it’s not stopping -

Cheating Automatic Toll Booths by Obscuring License Plates - crimes in cars are fine.

Random Radios

Fifty Things you can do with a Software Defined Radio - now I want one of these too!

Threads has entered the fediverse - there will be a shitstorm, let's see how it ends.

US sues Apple for illegal monopoly over smartphones - good!

Shaped like information - always funny. I am all for Hoboz! 

How the world sleeps, according to Garmin Connect sleep score data - unsurprisingly Spain isn't doing great.

Other Links

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.

Friday, March 15, 2024

Friday Links 24-08

Tablet with teapot, mug, biscuits, and milk

Quite a mix of topics. I recommend the podcast with Cal Newport and the article about learning to ride a bike ("Stumbling can be lovely")

Leadership

Joe Militello, Chief People Officer at Pagerduty: Why You Need to Rethink Your People Strategy [Podcast] - people strategy has to be part of every team.

Story: Leaving LinkedIn - Choosing Engineering Excellence Over Expediency [Podcast] - not really about leadership, but an interesting inside view about what makes someone leave.

How to be productive without burning out, with Cal Newport [Podcast] - speed vs sustainability. 

The “10x engineer:" 50 years ago and now - the "surgical team" idea always seemed a bit weird to me, even 20 years ago, when I read it.

Measuring Developer Productivity via Humans - about the benefits of qualitative metrics.

How I set expectations for skip levels - I am looking into skip levels at the moment.

Engineering

time_t is not GMT - it has no TZ.

Environment 

Air pollution levels have improved in Europe over 20 years, say researchers - not in most cities.

How did Norway become the electric car superpower? Oil money, civil disobedience – and Morten from a-ha - I always enjoy the a-ha part.

Olive oil becomes most wanted item for shoplifters in Spain - it is still cheaper than everywhere else.

Urbanism / Transit

OMFG DINOSAURS AND TRAINS!!!!! (with TierZoo) [YouTube] - it really isn't Germany's fault!

Health gains of low-traffic schemes up to 100 times greater than costs, study finds - surprise! 

Government tried to bury report which found that Low Traffic Neighbourhoods are effective and popular - no surprise!

Random Tea

Storm over a teacup [Podcast] - about Nepalese tea.

Berlin’s techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list - thanks for making me feel even older.

OldWeb.Today - use an obsolete browser, on an obsolete OS, to view dead web pages.

Dial Up Modem Sounds, from 300 bps to 56K [YouTube] - best subtitles ever?

Oh, that's what happened to Kickstarter - close web3 call!

My 5 Step Journey Towards Ergonomic And Fast Typing - I really should learn to type at some point!

‘We cranked up the madness’: Jack Davenport and Steven Moffat on making Coupling - still funny … even if a lot of it is outdated.

Learn your farm animals with AI! - "mock" "qlick"

2023 Garmin inReach® SOS Year in Review - busy west coast. 

Stumbling Can Be Lovely - "The hardest part is the launch, Hal says."

AI Prompt Engineering Is Dead Long live AI prompt engineering - let's just have the AIs doing the job of making the AIs doing our job.

Friday Links Disclaimer
Inclusion of links does not imply that I agree with the content of linked articles or podcasts. I am just interested in all kinds of perspectives. If you follow the link posts over time, you might notice common themes, though.
More about the links in a separate post: About Friday Links.