A couple of years ago, we got a recirculating pump to run the hot water line from the master bathroom back to the water heater so we could get actual hot showers. The pump came with a built-in timer so that we could schedule times for it to run. That’s swell if you live byContinue reading “SmartThings and the Recirculating Pump”
Tag Archives: programming
License and Registration?
If you read a book about software development or start a repository on github or bitbucket or launchpad, you’ll confront the question of software licensing very early on — likely, before you even get to the question of what development environment you’re going to use. I’ve come to decide that this is not really helpful.Continue reading “License and Registration?”
Software Progress
Over the past few days I have managed to put together enough patches for SifterReader that it is usable for me from my phone. I’ve submitted pull requests to the developer, but until he pulls them in, if you want to try using the app on your phone you will have to build it yourself.Continue reading “Software Progress”
Organizing my Life
Listing saves us. It is a way of exporting intelligence into the environment. Every datum the environment remembers for you is one datum you don’t have to remember. I am absolutely in favor of this, but it gets me into trouble when the systems I use don’t work well together. The smartphone and web servicesContinue reading “Organizing my Life”
Let’s Play a Game
I like to play games. Who doesn’t? But not just any game, I’m actually kind of particular about what games I like. I happen not to like zero-sum games; my favorite games are those where, by careful maneuvering, the players can achieve a win for everyone. I also like games where there’s complexity, because thatContinue reading “Let’s Play a Game”
Next Homework Program: Ratio Exercise
The Badb just had a couple of weeks of reviewing ratios. This was a good limbering-up exercise, since the problem sets were all about converting between different units and manipulating fractions. After all, ratios are just a different way of writing fractions. The general form of the problems wound up being, “Given that the ratioContinue reading “Next Homework Program: Ratio Exercise”
Prime Factorization – Actual Code
I finally had a little time free and put together a solution to the prime factorization problem. As with the tic-tac-toe program before, there are lots of opportunities to make this program better. This only runs once, rather than looping. The number being factored is a constant so you have to edit the program toContinue reading “Prime Factorization – Actual Code”
I Hate Your Favorite VCS
Whenever I have to start working with a new software package to do a task I already know how to perform using a different software package, I feel a little frustrated. I’m sure everyone can relate to this. Programs that do similar things are often unnecessarily differentiated. It’s as if DeWalt and Makita made cordlessContinue reading “I Hate Your Favorite VCS”
Hey, I Built a Thing
My new job involves hacking on Bugzilla and part of that involves email. Bug email, system administration email, yadda yadda. I wanted a way to test that email without it ever leaving my development system. We had a mechanism in place where the emails would just get written to a plain file, but that doesn’tContinue reading “Hey, I Built a Thing”
Time Out for SQL
Basic SQL is pretty simple, really. It’s only when I start dealing with big joins and group functions that I start to lose track of what exactly is going on. I’m in that situation now, so I’m constructing a small data set with short table and column names so I don’t have to type asContinue reading “Time Out for SQL”