Gemini* and Gopher

• Personal/Opinions

  • My favourite bands

  • Coffee

    We got an espresso machine. My partner has wanted one for a while and I wasn't too fussed (not a big coffee person). Eventually they bought a Lelit PL41EMD espresso machine and a Fellow Opus grinder, and I happily paid for half of it.

    It's been a few weeks now and I am obsessed. Getting the shot right is just the right kind of problem to captivate my attention. There are enough variables to tweak that you're always experimenting with something, but few enough that you can understand the problem space.

  • Lifelong useful skills

    It recently came to me that I had encountered a certain issue numerous times throughout my life. It was difficult for me to be able to tell the position and neighbours of letters in the alphabet without having to go through all or parts of the alphabet in my head.

  • 🔤SpellBinding: ACDWLRI Wordo: UNLIT

  • Supplementary Diggy Files: Overfed

    I thought that was noteworthy because in the wider context the web is becoming less usable (bad search results, AI-generated rubbish, etc.).

    Today I had an experience that reminded me of this. My phone has been a little slow recently, and I needed to free up some storage space. It turned out that my podcast app was (either due to a bug, or some bad configuration that was not clear how to fix) not deleting any old podcast files. They seemed to be deleted in the interface but there were 6 Gb of files in a folder not accessible from either the podcast app or the file explorer app.

    I'm sure there was some way to resolve this without losing all of the data in the app (what podcasts I was subscribed to, what episodes I had and hadn't listened to), but I opted for the quick solution: delete all data related to this app. 6 Gb cleared and phone zipping along happily.

  • Reading in 2024

    This year there were two things playing on my mind that shaped what I read. First, that my shelf of unread books was getting unreasonably large. Second, a brief stint using StoryGraph made it painfully obvious that I read almost exclusively male authors.

    I ended up reading a lot more in 2025 than any previous year, maybe in my whole life. Not only did I read in quantity but I felt like I kept reading absolute bangers. Therefore I've got quite a bit more to say in this year's write-up and a good few more thumbs-ups.

• Technology and Free Software

  • Toxic productivity

    There's a chap by the name of Ming Tang on the same mastodon server as I am at the moment. He posts enough for me to be aware of him as an individual. Usually little things about working hard and getting results. Things that seem like would fit better on LinkedIn rather than mastodon. It gives the impression that this is someone who is trying to build themselves into a brand.

    The latest post is in response I think, to the massive cuts to science funding in the states at the moment. I don't think it's deliberate, but I can't help but read it as toxic.

    "If you still have a job, be proactive. Don’t coast through your work. Put in your 100% effort every day. People notice when you give your best."

    "Don’t slack off. It’s easy to take your job for granted when things are stable, but biotech is a small world. Your reputation follows you"

  • One month into 2025

    In my last entry I said that Christmas 2024 was going to be one to forget. In fact it became one to remember as I got really sick, and for the first time in a long time. Thankfully it wasn't what I had feared, and I was soon on the mend again.

    I migrated from OpenBSD to FreeBSD (as a server) a while back, and I have since stopped tinkering with things. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" the saying goes, so I just leave everything be, and it runs smoothly.

  • Programming

    • Returning an error state in PHP

      PHP's loose approach to truthiness and falseyness means that I prefer returning null from functions instead of false when indicating failure.

      It means that the caller can confidently use the null coalescing assignment operator to set a default value. The equivilent Elvis operator cannot be relied upon in the same situation as it cannot distinguish between, for example, a boolean false and an empty string, the string "0", etc.

    • Devlog 7

      Making good progress today. I've not done too much programming, but it feels like I'm getting more done quickly which either means the project is in a good state or I'm about to hit a horrible brick wall.