Back in the Saddle
TL;DR: I got a job! Gonna keep writing though. As of this week, I’m back in the saddle in the finance industry, designing and developing leading edge platforms and systems for a new asset manager, my favorite kind of business. The challenges in the new firm are new to me and epic. And I love a good challenge. How does this affect… My current consulting customers? Nothing changes, all your projects are in support and the support levels will continue unaffected.
Pinbrowser for Pinboard Updated
I just downloaded the updated Pinbrowser for Pinboard from the App Store, an iOS app by Mikael Konutgan (@mkonutgan), and it just got a whole lot better. Pinboard is a paid for bookmarking site that focuses on speed, utility and longevity (and anti-socialness!). Pinbrowser is an iPhone and iPad application to access your Pinboard, other’s bookmarks (making it more social) and the all famous popular bookmarks list. It’s the social aspect that attracted me to the product in the first place.
WWDC 2013 Post-Game Review
Just under a week ago, Tim Cook walked out on stage to present the keynote at WWDC 2013 (Video here). It was an astounding success. I think Apple has become Tim Cook’s Apple, and the products announced are living proof of that.
After letting them percolate for a few days, here are my impressions of what was announced.
Accessing SQL Server from OS X
Every once in a while I need to access a Microsoft SQL Server database from my Mac, usually to create a data migration script. In the past I used a commercial ODBC driver. But ODBC on OS X was deprecated ages ago. In this post, I’ll talk about my current stack for accessing SQL Server databases via Ruby and Python and how to set it up. Note that I do not use homebrew, so these are all native installs.
Horizons
When I was a child, my horizon was the building I was in, my home. I could reach out and touch my family and whomever wandered into the house. As a teenager, I got a bicycle, and my horizon was the neighborhoods within cycling range. I could reach out and touch my friends in nearby neighborhoods. And I felt less constrained. Later, I learned to drive, and my horizon grew to the city I was living in.
Sharing Reminder Lists
Looking for a quick and easy way to share reminders with other people? Here’s how we do it. My wife and I share a Reminders.app list called Groceries that we check on the way home. If there is anything on the list, we pop into the shop and pick it up. Reminders.app is an Apple app included in iOS and the Mac that enables you to create lists, set reminder dates or reminder locations.
Google Analytics for Status Board Server Edition
Google has finally deprecated their GAPI interface which this used to talk to Google Analytics, sorry folks, it will no longer work. See the New Google Analytics for Status Board Server Edition for an updated version. Dropbox went down today, and I found out when my Status Board stopped updating. This spurred me on to migrate my Google Analytics for Status Board scripts from Ruby and Dropbox over to server based PHP.
Sanity Saver - Ticks and Crosses
Sanity Savers are quick tips that help you stay sane when using your computer. I often create point form lists of things, whether planning a post or a coding sprint or a client activity. And to keep track of which points in the list are done and which will not be done, or what is right and what is wrong, I like to use ✓ and ✗ symbols. I use them so frequently and am so lazy that even typing ,,tick and ,,cross TextExpander expansions are too much effort.
My Mac Indie Writing Workflow
Over the past few years, I have been writing more and more on my Mac, whether it be single blog posts, blog series, systems documentation, knowledge bases and other articles. The best part is that all the tools I use are indie developed from all over the world, are amazingly great and way better than their mainstream counterparts. In this post, I want to share the tools I use to write and why I choose them.
Letterhead - Markdown Style
So I get this request yesterday to send a document on letterhead. You all may remember letterheads from back in the day when companies had professional printers print their fancy logos on fancy paper that you then ran through the “good” laser printer that then went into matching fancy envelopes and someone stuck stamps on and mailed them. I thought that letterheads went the way of the dodo about the same time fax machines and US Mail both died out.