Recently updated blogs

There are a couple of things I always want to be true when I install Python packages for a project:I have a virtual environmentPip is up-to-dateFor virtual environments, you would like them to be created as fast as possible and (usually) with the newest version of Python. For keeping pip up-to-date, it would be nice to not have to do that for every single virtual environment you have.To help make …

My 23 hopes for 2023 didn't all come true. I'd say overall it was a pretty rough year for me in some ways, with high highs and monotonous lows, but hey, it ended on a redemptive and positive note! I'd say I achieved 12/23. Half really isn't bad. For 2024 (once again, not wishing for world peace here, as we all know what happens when you do that): I hope …

Cloudflare has a really generous free tier, and it gets a lot of free users. I often see comments on Hacker News saying "Cloudflare must be doing something shady, so many people use it for free, and if you're not the customer, then you're the product". This is mostly wrong -- Cloudflare gets a lot of value from its free users, in normal, not-shady ways. Here's why it's helpful to …

Ramses exhibition at the Australian Museum

This blog post explores the role of quality documentation, looking at different documentation types, effective strategies, and great documentation tools to start your documentation journey.

With another new year, Putin (24-year reign, if you include the tandem of 2008–2012) is catching up to the nineteenth-century rulers Alexander I (also 24 years), Alexander II (26 years), and Nicholas I (30 years). And just as getting to know the nineteenth century means learning about not just watershed dates, but gradations within one reign—like the comparatively open period under conservative Nicholas I in the mid-1840s, long after the …

I have worked for two newspapers over the course of my career (three if you count my high school newspaper). One thing I learned there is that the top half of each and every newspaper homepage is a daily battle of priorities. The idea here is that the thing that is highest, largest, and leftmost on the page will get the most attention. Placement and ordering of this content is …

I try to make myself and my immediate surroundings as self-sufficient as possible. There’s something innate in me that makes me want to do everything myself, to not depend on anyone, and even more so to be free. Of course, “free” can hide a lot. Despite how ingrained this part of my nature is, though, I can see where it’s been reinforced. As always, it begins with a “there but …

In August I bought a Kinesis Freestyle Edge keyboard off of eBay. I’ve been using it for about four months now, and I’m typing this review on it. I’d been wanting to try out a split keyboard for a long time but didn’t want to spend a lot of money on one. Good quality split programmable keyboards start at around $200. The Freestyle Edge I found on eBay was new …

I've decided to migrate this blog to a quarto-based blog format. All future posts will be found here: https://swingley.dev/blog2.

To write of Christmas after December 25th is neither a sin nor a crime, but there is something untoward in my tardiness. We meet the overdue Christmas missive with the same misgiving we reserve for the rooftop that twinkles through February. Even small children know—however much they may deny it—that the Christmas season cheers because it only lasts a season. The magical must be momentary. Thus we treat Christmas lights …

If you’re a horror movie fan, I think you’ll agree with the assessment that Scream (1996) is a top-notch meta horror-comedy. But did you know that it’s been accused of being a rip-off...

My year in review I’ll begin by briefly weighing in on five of the most prominent pieces of the 2023 zeitgeist, at least from where I was sitting. Some cynical vibes ahead, so feel free to skip past this part if you’re not in the mood for negative energy: Taylor Swift: Gen Z’s version of Beatlemania is a bit of a head-scratcher for me, since I find Taylor Swift’s music …

WARNING: This article contains spoilers for Star Trek: Picard Season Three, which as of this writing has been out for the better part of a year.In the spring of 1994 Star Trek fans were treated to the wonderful TNG finale "All Good Things". It was a little technobabble-heavy, but it was still an affectionate send-off to the TV adventures of the Enterprise-D crew as they made the jump to the …

Vincennes Review of Books 2023 is here!Key:* = Excellent, highly recommend~ = Actively bad, do not recommendFirst readsThe Book of Form & Emptiness–Ruth OzekiLove in Idleness–Charlotte Mendelson Straight Man–Richard Russo *The Complete Magazine Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1921–1924–F. Scott Fitzgerald *The Book of Goose–Yiyun Li The Imperfect Life of T. S. Eliot–Lyndall Gordon The Liar’s Dictionary–Eley Williams The Coaching Habit–Michael Bungay Stainer Cleopatra and Frankenstein–Coco Mellors The Waste Land: …