May 3, 2022
PyCon US 2022 Highlights —
It’s been three years since any of us have been able to attend PyCon in person. I had mixed feelings about attending this year because despite what most of us are being told officially, Covid isn’t over.…
Dec 1, 2020
Review: Are Prisons Obsolete? —
Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Davis
In the US, many of us are brought up laughing at people who are stuck in prison.…
Oct 19, 2020
Simplifying Django deployments on Heroku —
What’s wrong with Heroku’s process? A simpler process Technical details Why focus on the buildpack? Current limitations Try it out Long term goals Feedback What’s wrong with Heroku’s process?…
Oct 12, 2020
Exploring fractals on a cloud computer —
I’ve always been curious about fractals, and the book I’m reading uses fractals in an example. I started playing with the example, and found it a good chance to see how much faster a powerful cloud computer can render a fractal than my modest laptop.…
Aug 31, 2020
Cleaning up a messy, exploratory Python project —
One of my current projects is in a state that many people will probably recognize: it’s a small project that grew through the exploratory phase, got really messy, but has now proven to be really useful.…
Aug 10, 2020
What's faster than strptime()? —
I was working on a longer post recently about optimizing a messy exploratory Python project, where the file I was focusing on took about 16 seconds to run.…
Jul 26, 2020
Review: Serious Python —
Serious reading at the driving range.
I just finished reading Serious Python, by Julien Danjou. It was really satisfying to read a technical book cover to cover again, and it was also nice to read a technical book that didn’t require sitting in front of a laptop the whole time.…
Mar 19, 2016
Using Git for Technical Writing —
I recently finished writing Python Crash Course, an introductory programming book. The first half of the book is an introduction to Python, and the second half is a set of projects that build on what was presented in the first half.…
Feb 2, 2012
A sed one-liner, from my father —
I have known about sed and awk for a long time now, but I haven’t used either of them much at all.…