Upon2020 (archive)
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Learning to OpenSCAD
As a proud new owner of a 3D printer, obviously I have been attempting to learn how create 3D CAD models for it. My friend Joe Andrieu pointed me to OpenSCAD, an open-source, “programmer’s” CAD tool. Unlike all other CAD tools I’ve ever heard of, OpenSCAD uses a textual programming language to describe the object…
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In praise of commons-based development
Let’s say you run into an operating system bug on a Friday afternoon. You post it on a user forum. You ask around on IRC, and you find somebody who can reproduce your problem on a different system architecture. (Ha, I’m not crazy!) You investigate a bit, but nothing obvious shows up. Monday morning, you…
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Thesis: What blockchain is for
Last night I went to a blockchain meetup. Some presenter in particular enthused about applying blockchain to a problem where using it has no advantage whatsoever. Like almost everybody else these days I’m tempted to say. No wonder many dismiss blockchain as a complete fad. That got me thinking. What is the general pattern where…
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Photos from a Half Dome hike
I’m posting this in 2017, but the actual hike happened probably in the summer of 1996. You can see it from the picture quality! Wife and I started something like 7:30am, if memory serves, I reached the summit around 3pm, and we were back down in Yosemite valley long after it had gotten dark. If…
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Will cooperation replace competition?
Enthusiasm has been growing in many places about new, more cooperative models for organizing society, replacing capitalism as we know it today. Advocates of these new models are convinced a broad transition to large-scale collaboration is “inevitable” and starting to happen. Those of us who have not drunk the cool-aid yet sympathize (everybody is cooperating…