Category: Burningbird

Categories
Just Shelley

Home Sweet Home Outside the St. Louis Inner Loop

The last few months have been a blur of activity as we found, and bought, our new home. We’re now proud owners of a 3 bed/2 bath in unincorporated St. Charles county. I’m writing this from my office in the new home, watching the sun rise, sitting in its light by the window. The photo of the backyard is from the realtor’s photos. I’ll take some of my own when the weather clears.

One of the moving company people and the cable hookup guy both talked about how quiet the area is where we’ve moved. “Unlike St. Louis county and its recent troubles”, was left unsaid. I hate the thought that folks think we’re leaving St. Louis county because of those “black problems in Ferguson”. We picked the location because a) it’s close to Roomie’s job, and b) the housing is still relatively affordable where we moved.

But, it is true that we we also wanted to move away from Shrewsbury, though not for the reasons some would assume. If Shrewsbury is not Ferguson now, it will be in ten years. It has the same problems Ferguson has: too many police for too small a population, many of whom suffer much of the same arrogance demonstrated by the Ferguson police department. I haven’t seen any racism, but if other communities are any indication, it’s there, just under the surface. Compounding the problems of racism, and too many police stations under too loose a civilian control , is the fact that the generally liberal, white leadership in this area is the most astonishingly insipid group of people I’ve ever come across.

The attitude of the leadership is don’t rock the boat, don’t speak out; if you must protest, do it quietly and try not to disturb those attending the Cardinals game. Where the rural, conservative leadership in the state encourages people to speak out and to make a noise (as long as you’re speaking what they want to hear, and the noise suits their agenda), the leaders in the liberal urban communities surrounding St. Louis do the opposite: just shut the hell up and do what you’re told, people. You will vote for this candidate. You will follow these rules when you’re unhappy. Above all, you never question the leaders, because the leaders know what’s best.

It’s no wonder that Missouri swiftly tilted from purple to red in recent elections: the blue blood in our veins is thin, and anemic.

Now, in our new home, we’re surrounded by conservatives. We’re unlikely to agree with our neighbors on anything. But at least we’ll be surrounded by people who aren’t afraid to speak above a whisper.

And we have trees in our backyard.

Categories
JavaScript Writing

JavaScript Cookbook 2nd Edition: Live and Personal

JavaScript Cookbook cover

The second edition of the JavaScript Cookbook just went live at O’Reilly. If you’re wondering why I haven’t been writing about technology as much lately, it’s because I was saving all my tech writing mojo for the book.

We went a somewhat different path with the second edition. I spent a lot less time on syntax, and a lot more on JavaScript in use. When I wrote my first book on JavaScript, in the dark ages that was the mid-1990s, syntax was about all you had with JavaScript. Now, JavaScript is everywhere. It’s the programming language that ate the world.

Well, nibbled the world. JavaScript is still that friendly, approachable language, even with the new ECMAScript additions. JavaScript has never roared; it’s meowed and purred its way into our lives. Good kitty. Nice kitty. Here, have a closure.

In the new edition of JavaScript Cookbook, I covered JavaScript in the browser, and re-visited our old friends (Ajax and the JS objects), yes. But I also spent a considerable time covering JavaScript in the server, in the cloud, and in our mobile devices. The only environment I didn’t cover is the open source hardware, DIY, wearable world, and that’s because I feel these need more preliminary introductions to the environment, so you don’t do something like fry your new Raspberry Pi. Or Computer. Or shirt.

I will never join with those who are critical of JavaScript. I have always had fun with this language. There’s just so much you can do with it.

Categories
Documents

Mother Jones Fascinating Murder Mystery with an NRA Twist—and Documents

Mother Jones has a fascinating, longer look at an early murder mystery associated with none other than the NRA’s general counsel, Robert Dowlut. It would seem that Dowlut was originally convicted of second degree murder, a conviction that was later overturned.

In an act I’ve come to expect from Mother Jones, the publication has also provided easy access to all of the documentation that provided the basis for the story.

Journalists can’t always provide all of their background material, but when they can, they should. This allows others to review the material, enabling them to either agree or disagree with the writer based on the same material, if the writer forms a conclusion. At a minimum, this sharing ensures open access to documents that may be difficult for non-journalists to obtain—documents that may form the basis for other, future works.

There is nothing to agree with or disagree with in the Mother Jones article, since it’s very careful to remain neutral and factual in its retelling of the older story (and the more recent activities Dowlut has undertaken for the NRA). But the author, Dave Gilson, provides much to think about.

Categories
Books Writing

Writing from the bleeding edge

One of the challenges writing a book on technology is not only do you need to put words together in some form of coherent, possibly even interesting, manner, but you also have to understand the underlying technology enough to be able to explain it to others.

You can’t just “talk” about the technology, you have to understand it.

Not a problem, except when you’re getting into bleeding edge technology, like some of the ECMAScript 6 objects I’m covering in the second edition of my JavaScript Cookbook.

All you can do is work with the object, work with the object, and work with the object until you go from, “I hate this object. I hate this object. I really f**king hate this object” to, “Oh hey, this object isn’t so bad.”

Then you can write about it in the book.

Categories
Burningbird

Do I look pretty? Web site design tedium

I think I need a new look for my web site. Singular, now, since I merged everything back into one space. I decided people find stuff via social media anyway, so why worry about separating topics into separate web sites.

Besides, what a pain to manage.

But now, I think I need a new look and I haven’t a clue what I want. I see two trends in modern website design among the looks I’ve been exploring. I call them the Minimalist and the Maximalist.

The Minimalist is the design you see at the Node.js Blog and a lot of other primarily techie sites (though I am seeing it at New York Times and other major publications). It’s centered, minimal, no sidebars, few graphics—clean and plain. These pages are so trim, they load before you even know you want to see them.

The Maximalist is similar in being typically centered, but the similarity ends at that point. It features graphics. Sometimes, a lot of graphics. Enough to choke a server. They catch your attention, though. And you get a strong visual about the story even before you read the headline.

There are several Drupal themes that support the Maxamalist view, with sliders along the top front page, and full size photo headers on separate pages. I haven’t seen much in the Drupal world that embraces the Node.js Minimalist look, but it’s so simple, it could be easy to create.

The thing is, nothing feels right. I want to use HTML5 elements, and incorporate accessibility, as well as embrace responsive web design for the mobile world. Lots of Drupal themes to choose from, but none have reached out and slapped me across the face and demanded I pay attention.

So I guess I’ll just hang here with my plain black and white and burnt bird look, until something says, “Hi. You like me. You really like me.”

category: