Many senior software developers I’ve worked with have had their own PAGNI lists in their heads. YAGNIs, on the other hand, are more of an “argue about it every time” kind of list, not to mention as developers we often end up with “can we try to need this?” lists of things to try and learn that are more likely aren't gonna needs than probably gonna needs.

You aren’t going to need it, or will you probably need it?

PAGNIs and YAGNIs

 has a lot of great videos breaking down what makes a difference in guitar sound. This one might be the best because the guitar market for amplifiers (along with guitar pedals) has had this mix of classic collectors claiming only one amp can get one tone, and deep-state conspiracy theorists arguing one wire makes all the difference (but don’t 

 at the wire, opening the amp will change everything).

Turns out... nothing matters much except in what order the EQ and gain is added. So yes, a Fender 

 sound different than a Marshall. Unless you want them to sound the same. And no, your Soviet-era tubes don’t radiate magic sound waves into your signal.

Breakdown of where tone come from in a guitar amp.

I’m just a performer, I don’t know anything about circuits

I could hear the hard drive spin up if somebody accessed the machine, and a little chug-chug-chug while Festival (the open source text-to-speech engine I’d installed) generated the voice. Like footsteps approaching before the door opens.

 on this, lots of early 2000 throwbacks about hosting some stupid script on a laptop plugged into a university network, but also some good options if you wanted to serve something from home in the year 2022.

Do you? Probably not, but I do miss thinking of a server as a thing that I can physically know and not some amorphous cloud entity.

I wish my web server were in the corner of my room

the garbled text that is the result of text being decoded using an unintended character encoding.

In Russian this phenomenon is called "бНОПНЯ" (read "b-nop-nya") and was caused by taking the word "Вопрос" (meaning: "question") in win-1251 encoding and reading it as if it was in KOI-8 encoding.

Also this is called "крокозябры" (read: kro-ko-zya-bry, nonsense word, no translation) especially when reading a binary file in a text viewer.

The garbled text that is the result of text being decoded using an unintended character encoding.

TIL: Mojibake

, likely the last show I’ll ever see at 

 in Cambridge now that they’ve got the notice on the window to 

RIP The Middle East

Three loosely related thoughts on “getting things done”. Entirely not something on my mind after a week of work, for any reason.

: Some examples of people quickly accomplishing ambitious things together.

If you wish to build a ship, do not divide the men into teams and send them to the forest to cut wood. Instead, teach them to long for the vast and endless sea.

Teach Them to Yearn for the Vast and Endless Sea

I like blogs where people add little cartoons and drawings to the text, which makes me think I should do it more. This one does it, and is a good read: 

The last thing a worrier should do is wait around for something to happen. Anticipation doesn’t bode well for someone caught in a worry feedback loop, so the key is to proactively invest thought into a worthwhile challenge instead.

How to Beat Worry

We had plans to visit friends in Dorchester today, and earlier in the week I thought “well what else can we do if we have to drive to Dorchester”, then realized the 

 was nearby, and the weather looked nice, and it was “Princess & Pirates” day so why not.

. I’d never actually been there to see the animals. On a scale of 1-10 I’d give the zoo a solid 7. Going during Zoo Lights but not at night means the park is more decorated, and given that its past Labor day there wasn’t much of a crowd, although a few animals were away. I assume in Florida.

Franklin Park Zoo

Why do people climb the ladder? “Because it’s there.” And when they don’t have any other goals, the ladder fills a vacuum.

If you never make the leap from externally-motivated to intrinsically-motivated, this will eventually becomes a serious risk factor for your career. Without an inner compass (and a renewable source of joy), you will struggle to locate and connect with the work that gives your life meaning. You will risk burnout, apathy and a serious lack of fucks given..

The times I have come closest to burnout or flaming out have not been when I was working the hardest, but when I cared the least. Or when I felt the least needed.📈📉💔

🔗 Link: THE HIERARCHY IS BULLSHIT, WE CAN DO BETTER

THE HIERARCHY IS BULLSHIT, WE CAN DO BETTER.

We were out at lunch the other day and after burning through all the games on the front of the kids menu, Lorelei turned the menu over and started Tic-Tac-Toe on the back. Andrea suggested Hangman instead, and started explaining how you play it. It occurred to me that Hangman is… well kind of awful, so I suggested instead of Hangman we play DOOMCAT. Which is drawing a cat: two ears, two eyes, two pairs of whiskers, two teeth and then the DOOMCAT eats you. Which is also a little morbid but at least avoids antiquated forms of capital punishment.

We ran out of paper and then we ran out of food and left. Lorelei mentioned she liked and I thought, well, what if I just made it for you to play whenever.