dabeaz

dabeaz, 1 day ago to random

If you're not writing bad code, you're not learning anything.

dabeaz, 19 hours ago to random

Clearly I should stop digging.

dabeaz, 3 days ago to random

The end of an era tomorrow. Every year, the kids' K-8 school has had every grade from 1st grade up run a 5K at the end of the year. I'm no runner, but so far as I can tell, I might be the only parent to have run/walked it every year for 10 years in a row. Youngest kid graduates out next week so that's it!

dabeaz, 4 days ago to random

As far as I can tell, the primary use of RAII is to sound smart.

dabeaz, 5 days ago to random

I sometimes wonder if I should teach a project course (like raft or compilers) where you don't even know what programming language will be used until you show up. That would certainly be one way to make things even more exciting.

dabeaz, 6 days ago to random

Kid: "How do I play a blues solo?"

Me: "Play almost nothing."

dabeaz, 7 days ago to random

Recovering from last week's compilers course, working on various improvements. I've been experimenting with the whole approach of writing a "nanopass" compiler (basically, having a lot of very small compiler phases).

I'm struck by how much this approach really leans into issues of the type-system, but with respect to the implementation of the compiler itself. Wasn't fully anticipating the scale of it, but it's great.

dabeaz, 8 days ago to random

Thought: "Superstition" would be a good name for a programming language.

dabeaz, 9 days ago to random

Random thought: Something sort of like cicadas, but not cicadas. Instead, squirrels.

dabeaz, 10 days ago to random

Trying to convince the kid to do summer community band with me. Aside from the big hurdle of "playing with a bunch of olds", I contend that community band is the way to get good.

We'll probably play 20+ songs. Real arrangements. Stuff they'd play in the top HS band. You'd probably only get 1-2 rehearsals per song--tons of sight reading. People are there to play and have fun. So, it's totally chill, not competitive. Get to be out in the community. And it's free. Unlike band camp.

dabeaz, 13 days ago to random

Ramdom thought: Proper grammer used to be important to prove that you was educated, but maybe its best to avoid it to prove that your not AI.

dabeaz, 14 days ago to random

Saw a deer following/chasing a coyote this morning. Babies must be nearby.

dabeaz, 15 days ago to random

Note to self: "I'm sorry" is not the most tactful response when other parents say they're working on a project related to AI-- correct though it may be.

dabeaz, 16 days ago to random

Sure, there's bike riding. And early morning bike riding into the sunrise. And early morning bike riding into the sunrise in the crisp clear air after a rainstorm. But then there's early morning bike riding into the sunrise in the crisp clear air after a rainstorm under the wispy skies of an aurora borealis. In Chicago. Sublime.

Aurora borealis with Ba'hai Temple (Wilmette) in foreground.

dabeaz, 21 days ago to random

A bit sad about missing yet another PyCon (coming up soon), but mid-May is peak parenting season with all of the end-of-school events. And given the choice, gotta go with the kids.

dabeaz, 23 days ago to random

Current dilemma: Work on code? Or break out the pressure washer and go outside?

dabeaz, 25 days ago to random

I know I've been a bit checked out lately, but I saw some diagram about Python packaging the other day and I literally recognized none of the words written down on it.

dabeaz, 29 days ago to random

A few weeks back, I showed kid the insides of an Apple 2 and then a box of similarly looking electronic components. He picks out a 7-segment LED and says I want to do something with this.

I'm not sure he knew what he was getting into because all I've got are NAND gates. Figuring out how to represent decimal numbers in binary and displaying a corresponding decimal digit from scratch has proven to be much more involved than it looks. It's actually been a pretty awesome project.

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

Kid apparently has to give some kind of "TED" talk in English class today. I asked if it could be combined with something from Chemistry class, say thermite. Apparently not. So, what's the freaking point then?

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

Having some conflicted feelings about missing today's 30-year anniversary reunion of the graduate school research group I was in as a student. I think it pushes a number of buttons related to my "complicated" relationship with academia. I've always liked coding and teaching. That's basically what I do now. Coding and teaching. Playing other sorts of "academia" games though? Not so much. Especially those attached to status and influence.

dabeaz, 1 month ago (edited 1 month ago) to random

Must admit, I'm kind of unreasonably mad about getting a SEO spam related to content hosted on readthedocs.org (a first).

Edit: Just to be clear, it was NOT from readthedocs.org, but from some rando apparently thinking that some docs about LALR(1) parser generators needed some SEO. WTAF?!?!

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

The whole Voyager 1 thing is so inspiring. Although, I've always been inspired by the Voyager mission since I was a kid.

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

A fleeting thought that maybe I've been writing Python class decorators wrong all along.

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

A bit disappointed...

>>> exc = ValueError("Bad Value")
>>> match exc:
... case ValueError(msg):
... print("Failed:", msg)
...
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>
TypeError: ValueError() accepts 0 positional sub-patterns (1 given)
>>>

dabeaz, 1 month ago to random

Ahhh. Elevator problem. We meet again. (camera slowly zooms into a close up of steely eyes). "Bring it."