Thursday, May 24, 2007

system




I must Create a System, or be enslav'd by another Man's; I will not
Reason and Compare; my business is to Create.

-- William Blake, "Jerusalem"



Thursday, February 15, 2007

I was just in Vancouver at the Vancouver PHP conference, and it was really amazing.

When I got home, I noticed that my host-key authentication with SSH wasn't working. I knew that there were some files in /etc/ssh that needed to be modified when my Telus internet connection changed it's IP address. But, which files?


root.web 12 [/etc/ssh] # grep 169.253 /etc/ssh/* | cut -d ":" -f 1 | uniq -c
1 /etc/ssh/shosts.equiv
2 /etc/ssh/ssh_known_hosts


This command is neat and simple:

First, "grep" for a bit of the IP address.

Then, cut out the first field, delimiting on colons.

Third, find unique instances and count them.

Neato!

Saturday, January 27, 2007

The venerable master Qc Na was walking with his student, Anton. Hoping to prompt the master into a discussion, Anton said "Master, I have heard that objects are a very good thing - is this true?" Qc Na looked pityingly at his student and replied, "Foolish pupil - objects are merely a poor man's closures."

Chastised, Anton took his leave from his master and returned to his cell, intent on studying closures. He carefully read the entire "Lambda: The Ultimate..." series of papers and its cousins, and implemented a small Scheme interpreter with a closure-based object system. He learned much, and looked forward to informing his master of his progress.

On his next walk with Qc Na, Anton attempted to impress his master by saying "Master, I have diligently studied the matter, and now understand that objects are truly a poor man's closures." Qc Na responded by hitting Anton with his stick, saying "When will you learn? Closures are a poor man's object." At that moment, Anton became enlightened.

:)

From RE: What's so cool about Scheme?