The Boston Diaries

The ongoing saga of a programmer who doesn't live in Boston, nor does he even like Boston, but yet named his weblog/journal “The Boston Diaries.”

Go figure.

Thursday, March 14, 2019

A recreation of a scene at an office

The breakroom of the Ft. Lauderdale Office of the Corporation. On the counter are several boxes clearly labled “Krispy Kreme.” Sean walks in.

Sean

Dum de dum.

He stops dead in his tracks as he spots the Krispy Kremes.

Um …

Booming Voice

We don't see the person speaking, but it's a booming, Brian Blessed like, voice. As a side note, perhaps we can get Brian Blessed to play this part. Anyway, booming voice, unseen person.

Make a SAVE vs. Krispy Kreme!

Sean

Reaches into his pocked and pulls out a twenty-sided die. He shakes it in his fist and then rolls it on the counter. His eyes goes wide. CUT to die rolling on the counter.

D20

ZOOM to CLOSE-UP of the die on the counter. You can clearly make out the “1” on the top face of the die.

Sean

Nooooooooooooo!

Sean then dives into the Krispy Kreme boxes …

Nom nom nom nom nom …


“Is there a way to convert this integer to an integer?”

I would like to write an Apache client to have a specific layout for requests to a secure site, making a static website, not locally, that may look like a assembly loader. This is my first attempt at using SSL. It's a bit simple to do with a few steps, asking the user to decide whether I should use "Google App Engine" or "Google Apps", and then have them send a sort of hash in the request to that domain. However, I still want my site to be public so I can just open it in Google App Engine.

The reason is that my client does not want to do a simple submit / form put into my app, since that 'd be possible with the Google App Engine. The reason I want to use the Google App Engine is that it works as expected. However, neither of the examples I found for handling the request from the parent page (which I am guessing are compatible with the Apache re - server - side tomcat) work as discussed in the link at How to open an IE include in a new application in Python? and all, and the one i've tried. Is there any way I can help my client AJAX to connect to my Python app?

Via Hacker News, Configure Google App Engine to redirect to localhost

This is not a real question, no one actually asked for this. This question (and every question on the site) is a computer generated word salad that almost, but not quite, makes sense. You know, like a few questions actually asked by real people at Reddit or Stack Overflow who don't quite grasp the whole concept of programming, or English, or both.

And the creator of the page is a bit worried about this site being indexed by Google. It's a valid concern that this site will pollute search results, given that the corpus used to generate the questions are questions on other sites like Reddit and Stack Overflow. There were also some comments about autogenerating answers but given the questions are maddenly close to comprehension, the lack of answers might be a good thing.

But this does give me an idea for National Novel Generation Month 2019 …


The Repair Culture

I was using my computers when all of a sudden, I couldn't select anything with the mouse. My intial reaction was well, there goes the other PS/2-to-USB converter, but some subsequent experiments proved to me that wasn't the case—I could still move the mouse pointer, and the middle and right mouse buttons worked. It was just the left mouse button that no longer functioned.

I have a Logitech Trackman Marble from the 90s (it's not the same as what is being sold today as the Trackman Marble), and it's the second such unit I've used. The first one wore out and I had to go to Ebay to find a replacement a few years ago, I liked it that much. The thought that I would have to go through that trouble yet again filled me with dread.

In the meantime, I couldn't effectively use my computers. As Bunny and I were scambling to find a replacement mouse at Chez Boca, I decided to crack open the Trackman and see what might be the issue. It was easy enough to open, remove four screws and the innards were exposed. My initial thought was that the left mouse button (which gets the most use) had worn out. It was, but not in the way I expected. There's a portion of the button you press that activates the switch below it. It's a small vertical piece of plastic that pushes down on the horizontally oriented switch. And in that small vertical piece a groove had formed over the years of use.

After discussing the problem with Bunny, the solution we came up with was to use a small amount of Elmer's Glue (applied with a toothpick) to fill in the groove that had formed.

I want to report that the solution worked wonderfully! The Elmer's Glue hardened enough to make the left button work and if it ever wears out, I know how to fix it.

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[The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades]

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You have my permission to link freely to any entry here. Go ahead, I won't bite. I promise.

The dates are the permanent links to that day's entries (or entry, if there is only one entry). The titles are the permanent links to that entry only. The format for the links are simple: Start with the base link for this site: https://boston.conman.org/, then add the date you are interested in, say 2000/08/01, so that would make the final URL:

https://boston.conman.org/2000/08/01

You can also specify the entire month by leaving off the day portion. You can even select an arbitrary portion of time.

You may also note subtle shading of the links and that's intentional: the “closer” the link is (relative to the page) the “brighter” it appears. It's an experiment in using color shading to denote the distance a link is from here. If you don't notice it, don't worry; it's not all that important.

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