riansanderson

roads

tangentially related- does anyone have a good recommendation on an external CD drive that works well with macOS and has a good form factor and build quality?

I have an ancient thinkpad that I use a couple of times a year _just for reading cds_ and and have considered retiring it. But all the CD drives I see on amazon look like disposable crap.

Using the fabulous `llm` utility like this

``` pipx install llm pipx install strip-tags

curl -sf https://www.nytimes.com/ \ | strip-tags .story-wrapper \ | llm --system 'summary bullet points' ```

Read much much more goodness from the developer Simon Willison

https://simonwillison.net/2023/May/18/cli-tools-for-llms/

Connections with other human beings are irreplaceable.

Go for it. Focus on the people. Lead by example and people will be inspired by your joy of the subject.

I find this tactic works especially well kids.

Love the idea here and want to see the code and prompts, but the GitHub link is borken

There are books that can help with this action -> thought -> emotion spiral.

I found great help by reading the (IMHO poorly titled) Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living

https://a.co/d/1QeKVAn

Sonic, my local ISP in Northern California https://www.sonic.com/

Tech support people are knowledgeable, pleasant, available, and solve any problems I’ve had. Such a contrast to cable companies or wireless providers

At its root, I don’t think this question is really about the logistics of taking a sabbatical.

Something I didn’t fully recognize when I was burnt out: burnout is a personal emotional issue. At that time I (mistakenly) considered emotions a bug and not a feature.

So whatever direction you decide to go on the sabbatical, I highly recommend endeavoring to discover some emotional support and growth.

Online talk therapy has helped me greatly, but mostly the book I wish I had back then is “The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living”

https://www.amazon.com/Happiness-Trap-Struggling-Start-Livin...

I've been doing DevOps for a while now and have been struggling to put my finger on why at scale it turns out to be so...complex/underestimated/hard. This blog distills it down to an essence that rings true to me:

To successfully get an application into production, you need to be an expert in the application itself, the deployment target and the deployment methodology.

I disagree that all that expertise only needs to reside in one person, but you've got to have a well functioning team otherwise. And the more facility each team member has with each of those domains the better your odds of success.

It's a matter of when not if some issue is going to show up in production that is going to require more than a proverbial reboot. If the team lacks, or its dysfunction negates, expertise in any one of these areas then the service is living on borrowed time.

One of my favorite gifts for kids in the 6-12 year old range is the [Klutz Book of Paper Airplanes](https://a.co/d/2dscUDL)

It’s a great kick start for kids to inspire their inner maker. It has just ten designs, well laid out with good instructions.

I had a similar feeling about emails at my previous job. Turning off notifications didn’t really help, because when I’d see 15, or 50 emails piled up I felt this dreadful stew of emotions that I didn’t want to acknowledge and had no tools to handle. Leaving that job only partially helped me, it took weekly therapy sessions and introspection to figure out what was going on and to learn strategies to not get in the same predicament again.

Working at a FAANG you have benefit coverage to see a therapist. I highly recommend taking advantage of this to talk to a professional about the anxiety around Slack messages you are feeling.

If you don’t connect with the first therapist you find, try another. Your emotions are trying to tell you something, find someone who can help you figure out what the message is.

This is a thing.

Maybe this isn’t the real world, but a few months ago in the Apple parking lots in Cupertino targeted breakins were happening on a daily basis.

Once they stepped up security patrols thieves moved on to downtown Palo Alto and Mountain View.

Allergy shots: https://www.aaaai.org/conditions-and-treatments/library/alle...

For years I suffered with what I thought were mold allergies (they got worse after rain...) I finally went to see an allergist, got tested, then committed to the 3-5 year course of treatment.

I never thought there was anything I could do besides Zyrtec/Sudafed/Kleenex. Turns out I was allergic to dust mites, and there were some concrete changes I could make in my environment (wood floors, cleaning regularly, ...) That made a huge difference while I retrained my immune system.

I'm two years into shots (monthly now, not weekly), my symtoms are significantly better, and my only regret is that I didn't do this 20 years ago.

Sensor Platforms - San Jose California

Software Engineer - Tools and simulation development

http://sensorplatforms.simplicant.com/job/detail/14967-softw...

The individual hired for this position will be responsible for maintenance and upgrade of various internal Python tools, as well as ensuring their integrity for each release of the tool set. She or he will also be responsible for conducting periodic test scenarios of the product using theses tools, maintenance of tools used for real-world data collection, and help with test infrastructure for data anlysis in the cloud.

Sensor Platforms in San Jose, California

Algorithm Engineer

http://sensorplatforms.simplicant.com/job/detail/10953-algor...

In this job, you will work with a core team to develop algorithms for inferring context and user intent from non-ideal MEMS sensor data on smart phones and tablets.

You should be comfortable iterating quickly through a development cycle which will include the design and implementation of data collection experiments, algorithm development, integration into both embedded and non-embedded platforms, and verification against live sensor data.