Beats to think to
Like to concentrate whilst listening to hypnotic deep house tracks?
I've found the playlist for you.
I use it to focus whilst programming, check it out
Timezone value from offset #rails
Some apis just return a timezone offset from UTC. For example Facebook
Need to convert it to a timezone name?
Rails Active Support to the rescue, you just need to do something like this:
utc_offset_in_hours = 10
time_zone = ActiveSupport::TimeZone[utc_offset_in_hours].name
=> "Brisbane"
Most recent git branches
Sometimes I work on a few branches at the same time.
Emergency bug fix branch here, new feature branch there, performance update branch here, update gem branch there, etc...
Within a big project we sometimes have almost 40 branches at any one time.
So, being human I forget the name of the branch that I was working on last week, and also would like to clean up old branches that I no longer need.
So the solution git for-each-ref
Include a sort and formatting that includes last commit date, and author name. This is the command:
git for-each-ref --count=30 --sort=-committerdate refs/heads/ --format='%(refname:short) %(committerdate) %(authorname)'
Home Entertainment
Recently I have been investigating what the cheapest/easiest setup could be for a home entertainment system would be.
I have an old Macbook laptop that doesn't have a working touchpad and keyboard - but everything else works, so am using that as a media server.
So, my favourite combination of Software/Hardware is:
- Plex Server, easy to setup, works on all operating systems. You can add your own specific custom plugins, for example ABC iview in Australia, just look on GitHub.
- Chromecast - best $30 spent ever. Really simple device that works insanely well. Even without a media server, you can get some fantastic apps on your mobile - and cast from there.
- Plex mobile app ~$6, enables you to browse your Plex channels, and cast to your TV. Works on iPad, iPhone and Android.
Now all I need is a decent live sports channel, and I'll be set.
Best Coffee Shops to work from in San Francisco
You'll see the Nodes, Rubies, the GitHubs, and get power points (mostly). Plus great Coffee.
Not too much VC raising - app idea BS either.
First Lesson: Drawing a diamond with Ruby
I was reminiscing recently about what my programming exercises were at high school. I started on Turbo Pascal.
This is was one of the first, simply to draw a diamond shape, that looked like this:
*
***
*****
*******
*********
***********
*************
***************
*****************
*******************
*********************
*******************
*****************
***************
*************
***********
*********
*******
*****
***
*
I remember it taking forever, but loving it. So decided to write it out in ruby.
s = 10
(-s..s+1).each do |y|
(-s..s+1).each do |x|
print x.abs + y.abs > s ? ' ' : '*'
end
puts
end
Alternative solution:
s = 10
s.times {|u| puts ' ' * (s - u.to_i) + '*' * (u + u.to_i) }
s.downto(0).each {|u| puts ' ' * (s - u.to_i) + '*' * (u + u.to_i) };
Slime Mould Maze
Recently I attended a workshop at the Edge on 3D printing and slime mould.
The event's title was so whack, that I signed up - not knowing what to expect.. This is what we did:
First, an intro to 3D printing. We create a maze in TinkerCad
TinkerCad, was until recently going to shut down, but luckily AutoDesk bought them out.
It's a fantastic way to ease into CAD, and produce 3D printable things. Within 5 minutes I grasped how to use it. Super simple.
Then we made some Agar, chucked the 3D maze in to a petrie dish, and dropped a piece of ravenous slime mould into the middle of it, with some rolled oats.
Then I hid my slime mould in a dark box, and 2 days later - my simple maze looked like this - solved!
This is a fascinating timelapse video, of slime mould's ability to actually solve the maze intelligently.