One of the most thought provoking books I have read is Accelerando by Charles Stross. The ideas he has about the future of mankind and space travel are sure to influence the discourse around AI, post-humanism, and space exploration as technology–aided by the continued expansion of computing power–continues its relentless march forward. However, there was… Continue reading Corporations as an API
Budgeting Guide for Entrepreneurs
Many people are not ready to be business owners. They don’t have the financial literacy to balance a checkbook let alone read their balance sheet. Or they are in debt from the day they graduate high school until the day they die–forever paying interest that would be better used to generate income. If you hope… Continue reading Budgeting Guide for Entrepreneurs
It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work
Basecamp (formerly 37 Signals) has always spoken to entrepreneurs in a similar way as The Four Hour Workweek did. Their first two books (Getting Real and Rework) did not beat around the bush and got right to the point about what you need to do to leave the rat race and live life on your… Continue reading It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work
The Computers of My Life
For some of us, the loves of our life include the computers that much of the rest of our life revolves around. They provided us entertainment and helped satisfy our urges for knowledge and power. We may speak of our old computers as others may speak of past lovers. These are mine. My grandfather’s 8086… Continue reading The Computers of My Life
Security Questions
Security questions are evil. I am not even convinced that they are a necessary evil. In my younger days I would answer each security question with some variation of “F*** YOU” and then diligently record each security question and answer in the Excel file I kept for recording my passwords. Now I use a password… Continue reading Security Questions
Lego Organization and Databases
While driving my kids to school this morning, my oldest was lamenting a project he had to do in computer class. They had a big box of Legos and have to physically construct them to match pixel art. He had the usual questions of “What is the point of this?” and “How is this going… Continue reading Lego Organization and Databases
Your Next Five Moves
I have long held the belief that business content (conference talks, books, podcasts, blog posts) fall on a spectrum between inspirational and actionable. The very best content is both–it not only makes you want to conquer the world but tells you exactly how to do it. Often, content falls at one of the extremes. Purely… Continue reading Your Next Five Moves
Upgrading to Rails7 cssbunding, jsbundling, and turbo-rails
I had a legacy Rails app that uses Javascript, Turbolinks, Tailwind, Webpacker to glue it all together, and Docker for deployment. It all felt a bit rickety to where a light breeze or a yarn or gem update could bring it all down. Having just upgraded from Rails 6 to 7, I felt like it… Continue reading Upgrading to Rails7 cssbunding, jsbundling, and turbo-rails
Enterprise Knowledge Base (and Microsoft’s Lack Thereof)
Once businesses reach a certain size (usually when they have two or more people filling the same role–e.g. two client support people or two devops people) they realize they need a repository where they can store knowledge to be shared internally across the organization. That first knowledge base probably consists of some .doc files in… Continue reading Enterprise Knowledge Base (and Microsoft’s Lack Thereof)
Musings on the Metaverse
The idea of a metaverse captured the imagination of many a young geek after reading the early works of William Gibson and Neal Stephenson. IRC allowed us to chat with fellow computer enthusiasts around the globe in real-time. The web came along and added graphics to the stream of information entering our homes via crackles… Continue reading Musings on the Metaverse