markatkinson

I'd love to try NixOS but I still have PTSD from trying to run/use Nix on MacOS, across two separate profiles on the same physical device too.

Yea I'm with you there. I honestly don't even see ads. Even YouTube ads that start playing, my brain switches off till I can skip. I also don't read the news at all anywhere, so that helps.

Boet you broke the internet! I can't subscribe to updates :(

Don't go to the chat rooms...

To be fair I'd probably also delete the test.

https://xkcd.com/927/

Ahh yes, I know the feeling. My current list of projects:

- There's no speciality grade coffee in Zambia, and all the coffee beans in Zambia are from Zambian coffee farms. I've bought a small roaster and will start sourcing speciality grade coffee beans from Malawi, Kenya and Ethiopia and roasting for a few of the small stores and cafes around us.

- Converting a beat up Suzuki Samurai into a capable 4x4 rock crawler/off road vehicle to enter my own team into the Elephant Charge 2025 https://elephantcharge.org/ec-charge-2025/.

- Growing and propogating cuttings of coffee plants in my backyard to start an outgrowers scheme in on the border of Zambia & Congo.

- An emotion recognition app that has animated fruits and animals that dance and respond to emotion. I'd like to create something a bit more responsive for my child than the YT videos that exist (Unity).

- Helping my wifes company prototype and spec out some lease management software.

- Sourcing the equipment and ingredients to process my own coffee cherries into green coffee. I'll likely buy coffee from nearby growers and start processing as my own plants still have a couple years before they produce any fruit.

- Migrating a Flow project to Typescript.

- Learning Haskell by building a back-office API for another project in it.

Good job! You sound like a great grand parent and your grand child sounds like they're doing really well too.

ORMs are the devil in all languages and all implementations. Just write the damn SQL.

I think I might get this tattooed on my chest.

That's part of the charm. I think I've mostly replaced Notepad with Clipy.

Wow, I am in exactly the same position. I grew up in the 90's using all the versions of Windows. Notepad became such an essential part of my workflows that even after 10 years of being on a Mac, I still mentally "reach for" Notepad. I have yet to find a suitable replacement.

Thanks for this, will take a look. (One thing that comes close is Stickies on MacOS)

I think microbrewery might be a little 2010, you probably want to start a coffee roastery.

This is their dedicated webpage: https://hivepulse.co.za/

Too cool! Might give it a try.

Kenyan top bar hives is what you'll find in Africa and what people are familiar with. I'm trying to phase in more Langstroth hives for sanitary reasons.

https://www.beekeepingnaturally.com.au/natural-beekeeping/th...

Yea absolutely, I had a real eye opener moment when I spoke to a friend who keeps some random beehives on his farm. I thought I was going big with my 20 hives, and plans to scale up to about 60.

He casually drops that he has 250 hives, and that he's not that into it...

I went from a Full Stack Software Engineer -> Lead -> Eng Man -> Burnout -> Wild Mushroom Exporter in Zambia.

Currently trying to become a wild beekeeper dropping hives anywhere anyone will let me while coding on side projects at the same time.

I recommend beekeeping. Go on a course somewhere, learn a little, get a hive, make mistakes, learn, scale, profit.

Surely that's a joke "I am old now (almost 30)"

I feel you. I now just use email in my web browser via the respective providers recommended website, aka mail.google.com, microsoft.office365.exchange.email or whatever it is they are calling it these days.

4 minutes 58 seconds.

This is fantastic!.

Time to start speed running!

I burned out in 2021 quite badly. Moved to Zambia (from UK) and switched from primarily software engineering to wild mushrooms.

Still coded as a hobby and explored the parts of it I enjoyed.

Now in 2024 I'm back in the game and loving it! Glad I had the privilege to take such a long break and try something else. The key take away here is it took me years to properly recover (and therapy).

Go easy on yourself, don't get swept up in the frenzy of work. Work to live not the other way around.

I'm tired of fixing my own AI generated code.

Lovely website and what looks like a lovely app. Will download and give it a try!

We used to hide fruit in sockets with a small piece of paper signed "Decay Inc". Looking forward to a Smithsonian article about it in 350 years.

It's wonderful. Maybe just the nostalgia and familiarity of yesteryear kicking in, but I really enjoyed it.

Zambia has had almost 100% renewable energy for a very long time. It's only recently with more extreme weather patterns that energy consistency is becoming an issue. We've been exporting electricity for decades.

Despite that the country has remained incredibly poor and continues to circle the drain.

So I'd suggest, "they don't need X they need Y", is always going to be wrong because what is really needed is a blend of everything deployed in a very specific order depending on the country.

Man oh man, I couldn't agree more. I've been living in Zambia for the last 3 years trying to start an export business. What a nightmare.

I laughed out loud when I read "e-government". The sad truth is countries like Zambia are just not equipped or capable of running anything "e". I am forced to use Zambia's Electronic Single Window (https://zesw.gov.zm/zesw/). What an absolute shambles, a total failure. If you don't know the right individuals in the right departments you're getting nowhere.

From my limited experience the problem is centuries of poor to no education and such an extreme level of poverty that individuals are constantly in survival mode. How can I make it through the next day/week/month vs. family, financial and career planning.

So, if we can wave a "give Africa what it needs" wand, I wouldn't suggest Startup Cities, Cryptocurrencies & E-Governments, rather good quality education, healthcare and just enough financial security to exit survival mode. If you can hand that to Zambia (without the corruption that is there now), you'd likely see a nation flourish and carve their own path to success, probably without "startup cities" too.

P.S. Zambia has Special Economic Zones: https://www.lsmfez.co.zm/. They're fine for large conglomerates who want to save a few kwacha in taxes but are mostly useless to all other small business owners.

Yea I was tempted to make a joke that it took them 14 years (still ridiculous), but the new calculator app actually looks really impressive, and potentially will make learning math a lot more fun.

This feels like a parody of itself at times. I really wish they'd make these less cringeworthy so I could actually sit through the whole thing.

The saga continues. A email address is supplied by the Google Support dialog, play-care-priority@google.com, and after mailing the address for assistance I received an automated email saying it doesn't exist, or "Address not found".