Software History

Earlier this year, I watched the first video in the FastAI Practical Deep Learning course series ^1. I should continue with this course as there is so much that I want to learn about deep learning, especially in the context of computer vision and modern NLP. During the first video, the instructor, Jeremy Howard, imparted two teaching techniques that have stuck in my mind ever since:

I was up early, eager to reach my destination at opening time: Parc Guell. I heard the destination is popular among tourists; busy, often. I ventured, from subway to subway, to get there early. I got on the wrong subway on my way there which sent me back two stops, if I remember correctly. Upon approaching back to ground level, I saw a church in the distance atop a hill. The building felt magical. Far away, beautiful. Above the city. I looked down at my map and figured out where I would need to walk to get to Parc Guell.

The image above is from XKCD's

I just read a delightful blog post called

...

A yellowing leaf fell as I walked in the rain; calmly, softly. It reminded me of yesterday, when I looked out of the window for the first time this year and said to myself that autumn is approaching. The trees were taking on an amber hue.

Regular readers may have noticed I sometimes interject the name of the song to which I am listening while writing. He writes while listening to gold rush by Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is frequently mentioned, my favourite artist. This week I have been listening to Evermore. The words of songs on the album have been echoing in my head all week.

In the last week, I have had two conversations where someone has used a word that immediately made me think

Part of the thriving Glasgow coffee scene since 2018, MAYZE Is a speciality coffee shop that serves vegan bakes and vegetarian food. MAYZE also provides vegan and vegetarian catering services.

IndieWeb Utils v0.7.2 is out. In this release, we introduce utilities to help you work with Really Simple Discovery and Trackbacks. The additions to the library were inspired by this week's Homebrew Website Club London / Europe meetup. One discussion point was how arXiv supports receiving Trackbacks, an old standard used to notify one site that you have linked to another. Given arXiv's support of Trackbacks -- and its application as a way to build community around research papers -- I decided to add a few helper functions to IndieWeb Utils.

It's been a long while since my last proper

Do you want to chat about personal websites? Are you looking for assistance in building your own website? Are you interested in helping other people learn about websites and share your thoughts about owning a presence on the web? If you answered

I rest on the grass. The tree beside which I sat was the place where, a day prior, I had my closest encounter with a hummingbird. Seeing the hummingbird, I was filled with joy. A bird that sparked my curiousity at the beginning of the pandemic after being featured in an Apple iPad advertisement on the television was in front of me. Its wings moved quickly. The bird hovered, going about its day; a little moment of joy.

A few days ago, I came across an article titled

A young man with blonde hair looks down at his iPad. With artful movements of his hand and wrist, he is drawing a picture. I only caught a glimpse. I consider what the whole picture could be.

When I hear or read words I have not encountered, I often make a mental note.

I am fascinated by how words can evoke memories. Earlier this week, a friend used the word spelunking in a conversation. When I first heard the word, I thought

Maybe I have been underestimating cats all along. I have a feeling that cats can communicate with each other; the two cats in my house can share their thoughts and feelings. I am unsure how, but I wish it were true. Cats feel more perceptive, like they understand more about the human world than we give them credit for. These thoughts have been swaying around in my mind as I have been reading—and now that I have finished—The Travelling Cat Chronicles.

Do you ever get the feeling that where you are right now is just where you are meant to be, even if your plans for the day have been derailed? A feeling of contentment, made all the more blissful by the recognition that what you are doing now wouldn’t have been possible if the day had gone the way you had planned.

At last night's Homebrew Website Club meetup, I noted that I struggled to find the utility of a digital gardens for myself. Ender ^1 said that digital gardens are a different

For the last few days, I have been keeping a journal of my espresso brews. Here is a journal entry from earlier today:

I gazed up at the Empire State Building from a few blocks away. The building was illuminated with red, white, and blue, in celebration of Veterans Day. Tall buildings fill me with wonder, and this one arguably more so than others. The Empire State Building was constructed in approximately 400 days; wonderful, in the traditional sense of the word.

As I walked along the Embarcadero in San Francisco a few months ago, enjoying the morning light, I saw an incline on the pavement (or, to use lingo appropriate for the region, the sidewalk); an edge on which I felt tempted to walk. I was reminded of childhood: the impulse to walk on the edge of a pavement, placing foot after foot, trying to balance.

This post was written on Saturday, April 15th and published today, April 17th.

Earlier today, I moved all of the bookmarks, likes, and replies from my website to my bookmarks website that uses the Known platform^1. I am thinking about re-building my blog with Eleventy (11ty), a popular JavaScript static site generator, too. I made a comment in the IndieWeb chat about my experience after encountering a few challenges (read: learning!), to which a few people responded. I am far into the the project, but I realised I don't have the mental headspace to take on the full migration right now.

As a child, there were always a lot of mugs in the house. My dad collected them and would seldom part with a mug. For years, I did not understand why: (i) we had so many mugs; (ii) mugs were so highly valued. Over the last few weeks, I have realised that collecting mugs is not unusual, especially for coffee enthusiasts. If anything, it's hard to avoid picking up at least a few mugs that you absolutely do not need but will still find joy in having at home.

A few weeks ago, I saw the gates to the University of Edinburgh New College were open. This has, in my experience, been rare, as every time I walk by the gates have been closed. When I saw the gates open, I took the opportunity and went in to take a few pictures of the courtyard. The view was beautiful. Visible behind the college building was a church on the Royal Mile, standing high. I took a few photos but the one above was my favourite.M

I love reading cafe reviews. A few weeks ago, I came across SOLO Coffee, a blog written by Eline Ferket, that features detailed reviews of cafes around the world. I started reading her reviews on Scottish cafes, given I live in Scotland, and I grew more intrigued with her writing style. I had the pleasure of talking with Eline over email to chat about her blog. The interview is below, edited lightly for clarity.

I was recently chatting with a friend about ordering espresso in cafes. I said that I used to never order espresso from cafes. Even as I learned about speciality coffee, I preferred to order milky drinks when I was out. I reasoned that if I was in a cafe I would prefer to have a drink that I could sip on. Also, I love milky coffee drinks so I would seize the opportunity to order one. Now, however, I am ordering more espresso at cafes.

I was walking around Edinburgh today. On my way down a street with a narrow pavement, I was in a position where it was unclear to me in what direction I should walk. The person in front of me shuffled one way and I did, too.