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The short-form week of 9–15 Dec 2013

16 Dec 2013; last modified 17 Dec 2013

The week in review, 140 characters at a time.

This document was created automatically from my archive of my Twitter stream. Due to limitations in the Twitter API and occasional glitches in my archiving system, it may not be 100% complete.

In a conversation that started on Sunday at 08:10pm

This year, put some absinthe in the eggnog. I am absolutely serious.—@ndw
@ndw might it may be overkill in eggnog, but if you want fine absinthe, check out Heavenly Spirits imports http://heavenlyspirits.jimdo.com/ @Spiritguy—@n1vux
@ndw We did: https://t.co/O1cRNyFhX6—@LaClandestine
@LaClandestine That’s really odd. I did not tweet that and it doesn’t show up in my stream. Not that it sounds like a bad idea, but…weird—@ndw
@ndw Make sure your piano is clean afterwards. Absinthe makes the harp grow fondants.—@barefootliam

In a conversation that started on Friday at 05:29pm

Why I'm turning JavaScript off by default http://tommorris.org/posts/8677—@tommorris
What. Tom Morris. Said. http://tommorris.org/posts/8677 Please. /via @tommorris—@ndw
@ndw Or, in slightly more graphic language, http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ /cc @tommorris—@gimsieke
@ndw @mamund @tommorris I used to do this too. I agree in many ways... it's why I'm glad Ember focuses so much on URLs.—@steveklabnik
@steveklabnik yep URL support is good. there's another angle. over-scripting stunts the growth of browser features. @ndw @tommorris—@mamund
@mamund @ndw @tommorris the TAG is specifically trying to do the opposite, but I totally get what you're saying—@steveklabnik
@steveklabnik when easing, tabs, suggest, accordion & other common script-based controls appear as native, let me know. ;) @ndw @tommorris—@mamund
@mamund @ndw @tommorris yup! that's the idea: implement in JS, standardize, native-ize: http://extensiblewebmanifesto.org/—@steveklabnik
@steveklabnik my read of that site is to add low-level scripting to browsers to support plugin services. is that native? @ndw @tommorris—@mamund
@mamund @ndw @tommorris see the very last link on the page: http://smus.com/how-the-web-should-work/ and then "forward polyfills"—@steveklabnik
@steveklabnik i added my comment to the g+ thread. thanks for the pointer. @ndw @tommorris—@mamund
@ndw +1000 @tommorris—@mamund
@ndw @mamund @tommorris nicely written "get off my lawn"—@locks

In a conversation that started on Sunday at 08:06pm

Pretty sure I'm going to go with the Lenovo W530. Now just have to commit. #linux #laptop—@ndw
@ndw I have a 520 that I have been pretty happy with. It has been sturdy and performs well.—@feralwriter
@ndw Not a rMBP? I couldn't go back to 1600x900 after experiencing 2560x1600—@geoffarnold
@geoffarnold The W530 is a tolerable 1920x1080. I object to being sold a box that’s glued together. I always wind up upgrading disk/memory.—@ndw
@ndw Ah, well. (I'm flashing back on Scott McNealy telling Sun employees that they'd pay extra for a bike to be delivered disassembled!)—@geoffarnold
@geoffarnold No, but would you buy a bike that made it impossible to change a tire or fix a broken chain?—@ndw
@ndw I've had five "glued together" laptops over recent years (some I've cascaded to family). None has failed.—@geoffarnold
@ndw Depends on the costs and failure rates. It's an economic choice, not an ideology—@geoffarnold
@geoffarnold Sure. I’m also annoyed that they don’t make the 17” model anymore. And I don’t think 16Gb is enough memory. Change is good.—@ndw
@ndw For dev work requiring >16GB, I use a cluster of Intel NUCs.—@geoffarnold

In a conversation that started on Monday at 04:08pm

If I’m going back to Linux, I suppose I should subscribe to Linux Journal again. Anyone know if they’ve fixed their broken epubs?—@ndw
@ndw heh, one of my first tech jobs ever was copyediting Linux Journal way back in the day.—@kendall
@ndwhttp://lwn.net is where all the fun is. (I am obviously not affiliated at all).—@mcepl

Monday at 08:18pm

Marginally controversial post. Agreement: good for ego. Disagreement: good for mind. Totally missed the point: good for a chuckle.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 09:28pm

@cramerdw Absolutely one of the best strips of all time. Yes, I know the meaning of “of all time” and the length of infinity. Of all time.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 04:33am

@nic_gibson or @ndw - any pointers? RT @tom_yamahito: Can anyone point me at an example of using pxp:unzip with binary files in #xproc ?—@tom_yamahito
@tom_yamahito @ndw Afraid I’ve avoided playing with binary files in zips. Sounds like a good thing too #xproc—@nic_gibson
@nic_gibson @ndw back to p:exec!—@tom_yamahito
@tom_yamahito @nic_gibson I can probably cook one up. What sort of thing do you want to do with the binary file?—@ndw
@ndw All I really need to do is rename it in the zip - tho' I'd assumed that to do that I'd have to store it on the filesystem? @nic_gibson—@tom_yamahito
@tom_yamahito Wow. That’s a lot harder than I’d have imagined. And appears to have turned up a bug. Will fix asap.—@ndw
@ndw I know, right!? What was the bug?—@tom_yamahito
@tom_yamahito The URI handling is weird and I can’t seem to get a binary file into the ZIP. https://t.co/nMDiMcO2eZ—@ndw
@ndw Glad to "help" ;)—@tom_yamahito
@tom_yamahito There: https://t.co/Be3OLZAEWb (It shouldn’t be that hard, though I’m not sure renaming zip entries is in XProc’s sweet spot)—@ndw
@ndw Thankyou! I thought XProc would be worth a shot because there's a corresponding transform to call-outs in an XML file in the same zip.—@tom_yamahito

Tuesday at 07:15am

XML Stars, the journal is out! http://paper.li/dominixml/1329135087 Stories via @ndw @JamieXML @xmlguild—@dominixml

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 04:27pm

Dear Bankers: Stop. Just stop everything. Throw it all away, rethink it, and start over.—@peropaal
@peropaal When they’re raking it in hand over fist? Seems…unlikely.—@ndw
@ndw very unlikely, perhaps crypto-currency has some disruptive ability. Hope.—@peropaal

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 04:33pm

"Beep!" says my UPS to tell me the power went out for a sec. But it's too lame to help. Down goes my computer.—@dckc
@dckc I don’t think the word “uninterruptable” means what you think it does.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 08:42pm

Drove down to Silly Con Valley today to give a talk about SemWeb. Reminded why I don’t commute.—@bsletten
@bsletten And well done, Brian! Thank you! My commute was fine ;-)—@ndw
@ndw Glad to hear it. And, thanks.—@bsletten

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 09:51pm

@kendall Got email about Gruene, but no tweet. (Maybe they use Mongo?) In any event, if I'm home, I'm in!—@ndw
@ndw I typed "beef", meant "beer". Visiting after Xmas.—@kendall
@kendall Oh, well, in that case...nah, just kidding. Away in mid-Jan, otherwise, I'm there.—@ndw
@ndw Will be in Houston but might show my wife and girls Gruene Hall and NB. If yr game?—@kendall
@kendall Absolutely. Pick a day and I’ll be there if it’s at all possible.—@ndw
@ndw 29th or 30th, I'd guess...—@kendall
@kendall Just let me know...—@ndw

Tuesday at 11:36pm

Reboot and try it again #FiveWordTechHorrors—@ndw

Tuesday at 11:38pm

RT @jonbakke: Find out why #MarkLogic is THE database company to come and work for!! We are hiring Solutions Architects all over the world…—@ndw

Tuesday at 11:42pm

It will work in production #FiveWordTechHorrors—@ndw

Tuesday at 11:47pm

“Theology is astrology--not a basis for national policy” https://t.co/BfUrJ2dOuH—@ndw

Wednesday at 10:55pm

Random things I will *not* miss when I leave OS X behind, those fscking .DS_Store files.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 03:47am

@danbri Reducing SPARQL standard to Xquery is someone's sick idea of a joke, surely.—@kendall
@kendall @danbri reducing sparql to xquery isn't good, but queries with full support for xml, json, and rdf make sense in today's systems.—@jonathan_robie
@jonathan_robie @danbri I'm very skeptical of that, but it's a sound technical idea at least. :>—@kendall
@kendall @danbri which part are you skeptical of, and why?—@jonathan_robie
@jonathan_robie Skeptical of "queries with full support of XML, JSON, and RDF". Why? Why not.—@kendall
@kendall i have repositories with xml for document data and json for program data, add RDF for linked data, now how do i query that?—@jonathan_robie
@jonathan_robie Why stop there? You also have log data, other time series data, CSV, etc. Where's the database to query all of that too?!—@kendall
@kendall @jonathan_robie Uhm, I hav…no, nevermind. :-)—@ndw
@ndw @jonathan_robie No, hey, that's fine: there are multi-modal databases! I just don't think that's the big unstoppable future trend.—@kendall
@kendall @ndw are graph databases are the big unstoppable trend? my big data is JSON, less XML, even less RDF. linked data may change that.—@jonathan_robie
@jonathan_robie @kendall @ndw I think sparql on XML&JSON data will be popular. Trees are simple graphs ;) Graph view on legacy data is easy—@jervenbolleman
@jervenbolleman @jonathan_robie @ndw Maybe. But better to just give a canonical mapping of JSON & XML to RDF and then declare victory.—@kendall
@kendall @jervenbolleman @ndw the way to prove that is to work the XQuery and JSONiq use cases using that approach. i'm skeptical.—@jonathan_robie
@jonathan_robie @ndw I didn't say there was a big unstoppable trend. Don't put words in my mouth.—@kendall
@kendall @ndw ok, sorry to misread you. i do think big data and nosql are unstoppable trends, and workflow as part of data management.—@jonathan_robie

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 09:44am

I pushed the button. Thinkpad W530 with all the knobs turned to 11.—@ndw
@ndw I'm on the point... T440p... is it worth it....—@dpawson
@ndw which OS are you planning on?—@robinberjon
@robinberjon Linux. Mint, perhaps, unless someone points me to a better answer. I plan to try Lightroom/Photoshop in a Windows VM.—@ndw
@ndw @robinberjon I'd love to hear how it goes. Contemplating similar move., and LIghtroom one of the major holdups.—@simonstl
@simonstl @ndw Yes, please write up some kind of migration diary that we may learn from your brave exploration of yonder platforms.—@robinberjon
@simonstl My biggest concern is the text editor, but @ndw won't be helpful on that front :-)—@robinberjon
@robinberjon @simonstl I can be most helpful. I couldn’t actually be *more* helpful. Use #Emacs.—@ndw
@robinberjon @simonstl @ndw I'm pretty sure vim is supported on Linux too. (As is SublimeText if I recall)—@perigrin
@ndw Hmmm. I'm not sure if I'm annoyed by OSX enough to switch to Linux just yet. Though it surely is getting closer.—@robinberjon
@ndw Watch out that doesn’t make the back fall off ;-) (I will be very interested to see how you get on. Would love viable alternative)—@fidothe

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 11:19am

XML Calabash 1.0.16 released. http://xmlcalabash.com/—@xmlcalabash
@xmlcalabash congrats on 1.0.16! “extension to store text with p:store” how’s that different form p:store[@method=‘text’] ?—@rdeltour
@rdeltour @xmlcalabash If you get a base64 encoded c:data element containing plain text, store[@method=‘text’] won’t do what you want.—@ndw
@ndw aha, I see! thx :) @xmlcalabash—@rdeltour

Thursday at 11:25am

RT @docbook: DocBook V5.1CR2 released. http://docbook.org/—@ndw

Thursday at 11:25am

RT @xmlcalabash: XML Calabash 1.0.16 released. http://xmlcalabash.com/—@ndw

Thursday at 11:30am

Dear random lead gen/mktg/SEO guru sending me spam, it would work better if you spelled my name right. No. Actually, it wouldn’t. #goaway—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 11:57am

@ndw To give you an idea, I waited 21 days before @lenovo shipped my customized T440s (paid 21/11 - today).—@ColinMaudry
@ColinMaudry Yeah. The estimate before I placed the order was four weeks.—@ndw
@ndw #whenwillitship times many more ... #kickstarter!—@azaroth42
@ndw I was just given 17 days by 'Laura', wonder who'll get theirs first....—@dpawson

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 12:51pm

Calling senior software engineers. Here’s where ya wanna be: http://www.marklogic.com/company/careers/career-opportunities/—@ndw
@ndw No way, man. Everyone knows you guys destroyed the global healthcare system. THANKS MARKLOGIC!!!1—@MattioV
@MattioV *snort*—@ndw

Thursday at 02:54pm

RT @grechaw: When I hear "documents are dead" I think the speaker is either really naive or a ludicrous futurist.—@ndw

Thursday at 03:00pm

RT @duncan: The NSA is out of control and must be stopped - T. C. Sottek writes about the NSA in the Verge http://jdd.io/post/69807112654#_=_—@ndw

Thursday at 05:57pm

Anyone can write to it. #fivewordtechhorrors—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 07:03pm

Whenever I put on an apron and tie a bow behind my back, I am reminded of how excited I was at about age 4 when I successfully tied my shoe.—@ndw
@ndw It's the little things. :)—@alexmilowski

Friday at 04:40am

Interesting thread on RDF, XML, and JSON querying by @danbri, @kendall, and @jonathan_robie with guest cameo by @ndw https://t.co/iz9kfGSdaB—@bobdc

Friday at 07:15am

XML Stars, the journal is out! http://paper.li/dominixml/1329135087 Stories via @ndw @xmlgrrl @georgebina—@dominixml

In a conversation that started on Friday at 12:01pm

Friends amp gets random errors. I’m no audiophile. Is there an obvious right answer for a ~100wpc amp to drive a few outside speakers?—@ndw
@ndw What kind of errors? How many speakers?—@kendall
@kendall It gets “protection” errors which (I’m told) it never used to get. Drives four outdoor speakers, I believe.—@ndw
@ndw Crown makes a lot of really good, multi-channel amps with tons of power. Check Amazon.—@kendall
@ndw Series vs parallel hookup can put the combined impedance out of spec for a channel. I'd start with that diagnostic.—@donrday

Friday at 01:29pm

Oh, look, procmail has accumulated more than 5Gb of saved mail in my .incoming/backup folder. #oops—@ndw

Friday at 04:39pm

RT @dweinberger: #Oxford Univ. posts gorgeous high-res scan of Gutenberg Bible. Thank you for the gift to all of us, Oxford! http://t.co/LT…—@ndw

Saturday at 11:26am

RT @tef: so, communists are on the moon, americans are spying on everyone, and a large advertising company is expanding into military robots—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Saturday at 04:13pm

@ndw oh, I naïvely thought calabash v2 was scala… you even renamed the project ? //—@rdeltour
@rdeltour It is Scala, did I say it wasn't?—@ndw
@ndw nah, I was kidding (I admit it wasn’t obvious). see the links: JS-based flow programming… made me think of XProc for node.js :)—@rdeltour

Saturday at 05:15pm

Grandle: The untangler of lights. #christmassuperheroes—@ndw

Sunday at 09:26pm

Random headhunters hoping to work with me and "Sun Microsystems" in the new year aren't doing themselves any favors.—@ndw