Category: Nerd Fun

  • Surface Pro 3: Patience is Rewarded

    I recently acquired a Surface Pro 3 during a Black Friday sale from a local Microsoft Store. I knew I was in for a challenge but I was up for it. I’m from the generation that witnessed the rise of personal computing in the late 20th century from clunky calculator-like boxes with tiny displays and…

  • I Wrote a Customer Review on Amazon

    I purchased an Asus monitor for my Mac Mini as a cheap alternative to the 27″ Apple Thunderbolt Display. I had a couple of tips and shared them on Amazon. A couple of things to note: Amazon make writing the review insanely easy. When I logged into Amazon it prompted me to rate and review…

  • This belongs on Tumblr

  • April 1, 2014 Tech News

    Google Announces Google++ Google++ users will have access to a social network with encapsulation, multiple inheritance, and polymorphism. Google++ users get the added benefit of UML diagrams and free advice from the Gang of Four (The computer scientists, not the punk band). Yahoo! Acqui-hires Apple To ensure it has the right talent for the 21st…

  • Getting Xcode and GitHub to work together like besties

    Updated for Xcode  Version 7.3.1   Thanks to  Jake for pointing out that his blog post needed a little freshening up! After watching the WWCD keynote I wanted to fool around in Cocoa and Objective-C again. It’s been a while and my Xcode skills were rusty. One task that always seems tricky is getting Xcode’s…

  • HyperCard: What Made it Leet

    I posted a blog entry on HyperCard yesterday on The Huffington Post: HyperCard: The Original Bridge Over the Digital Divide. From the comments and tweets that I got it was pretty clear that us older hackers have fond memories of HyperCard. But there’s the rub–Us older hacker. Kids today, i.e., people in their twenties, missed…

  • The Little Computer that Taught Me

    The TI 99/4a from Texas Instruments still looks pretty awesome after 32 years! The personal computer I really wanted to work with back then was the Apple II but as a university student of modest means the big Apple was too much for my bank account to handle. I considered the Commodore VIC-20 and Atari…

  • How Engineers Will Win

    Before reading this, you should read Why Engineers Never Win and Why Engineers Should Win. Ok, now we’re all caught up. I’m optimistic. Yes, I know the world is hurting. I see how the people trying to do good often make things worse. I can’t claim to be insightful when I observe how we celebrate…

  • Fraction: Does not recognize selector forward::

    If you’re crazy like me you love reading really good primers on programming. Not just to learn about a particular language but to enjoy well written technical prose. (Yeah, I said I was crazy). Yesterday, I started reading Stephen Kochan’s classic Programming in Objective-C (original edition), which was published in 2003. What I like about…