Author: Daniel

Daniel https://turnings.phrasewise.com/ In the 4th grade Daniel was asked to step in into the hall because he was coaching fellow students on a similarity assignment he provided the class. Since then, Daniel’s passion for helping people has propelled him to be a creative developer of software and systems, and a team coach who excels at successfully delivering business value. Daniel founded QuietlyHelping in 2009 in order to have a direct hand in helping families with the struggles of debilitating disease. QuietlyHelping is an organization of compassion and empathy that brings ease, comfort, smiles, laughter, healing, and love to people battling cancer and other diseases. Spare time activities include cycling, occasional work as a musician, woodworking, photography, and reading books he never got around to in school. Unsurprisingly, Daniel is able to cook minute rice in just under thirty seconds.
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Karate Monkey build

daniel testing karate monkey build After a weekend with no voice, and the gentle knell of my attempts to clear my throat the predominant sound in the house this weekend, I dropped by the RBC picnic with the as yet untested build of my Karate Monkey. Mostly Deore, a few Ritchey bits, and Avid mechanical brakes, the build is fairly inexpensive and not particularly light. To me that means not worrying about breaking stuff, getting it muddy and wet. I have some bits and pieces in the closet to try, some handlebars, a wheel, etc. and I’ll do that slowly over the next few months… but I’ll talk about them more when I get them on the bike. It is fun to ride even now.

I’d love to try a truly fat tire like an Endomorph on the front to see what that feels like. Maybe someone has a Pugsley or something in the area?

I was dressed casually (even sloppily) for the picnic, which explains the running shoes… but it was really humid and hot out, especially the spot where the picnic was held. When we went for a ride around the lake, it was obvious that there were much cooler spots. The club is raising funds by taking portraits of members with their bikes. I have every intention of doing this, but yesterday was not the day I intended to do it. Between my cold and the heat, the lack of caring about the way I dressed… I was a site. Nonetheless, pictures were taken by David, and naturally I look awful. Awful! No matter. I do enjoy the pictures of my playing photo apprentice and NBA style sweat mopper as seen here for my riding pal Jenni. I can’t wait to do this for real (the picture part, not the apprentice part) with Lisa & Noah.

A few of us who brought bikes decided to loop the lake. I ride a road bike so much of the time nowadays that in trying to navigate around the families that sometimes clog the path, I’m reluctant to run on the dirt. There I am hesitating, checking out the dirt looking to see if it is firm enough when a fat tire angel (or is that fat and tired angel? Whatever… :~) whispers in my ear that to stop looking and just go. Hah! So much for skinny tires.

After one loop the picnic crashed to a close with a thunderstorm and copious amounts of rain. Fun!

Finding A Friendly Cloud

Finding A Friendly Cloud: Jason Hoffman, founder and chief technology officer of a cloud-computing specialist called Joyent, was particularly pointed in warning that Google’s App Engine could represent a lock-in to developers. It is possible to build “a loving cloud,” he argued, that would make it easier to create applications that could be easily moved among different services. Other panelists kept calling Google’s App Engine “proprietary,” which to many techies is equivalent to labeling it both evil and outdated at the same time. [Bring on the loving cloud, people. Bring it on!]

MacRuby

MacRuby is a version of Ruby 1.9, ported to run directly on top of Mac OS X core technologies such as the Objective-C common runtime and garbage collector, and the CoreFoundation framework. While still a work in progress, it is the goal of MacRuby to enable the creation of full-fledged Mac OS X applications which do not sacrifice performance in order to enjoy the benefits of using Ruby.

MacRuby is a free software project by Apple Inc. Sources are available under the Ruby license.

[It’s the last line I find so interesting. Also, that there are so many of these sorts of efforts taking place. IronRuby, now MacRuby, Rubinius, MagLev, etc. Great stuff for the Ruby world.]

No more space

Articles like this about the “Battle for Central Park”, where joggers and runners are forever aggravated at cyclists and vice versa, and everyone hates the car folks and vice versa, don’t speak to anything but extreme crowding.

The resources (open space, clear of “traffic” (defined as anything that interrupts *your* activity)) are too scarce. We are constantly jostling each other in our attempt to simply move about. Of course everyone is annoyed! Sadly though, there is a strong sense of entitlement and greed that runs as an undercurrent to the interactions.

I have no answers here, except for my personal one of making a choice to find more space for my family as quickly as possible.

Subway

photo_token.jpgI haven’t been on a Subway in a while… every few months it seems there’s something that causes me to take one, but I don’t ride the subway on a regular basis.

Going to meet a friend for lunch the other day it seemed to make sense to grab one, so I (and my boss) did. We got some unrequested help from the platform guy, who in years past would’ve been stuck in a booth handing out tokens, but now is amongst the people walking then through the steps of putting value into Metrocards.

As we swipe our way through the turnstiles, someone cuts in front of us and jumps the turnstile. He then proceeds to walk down the platform and pees into a corner. He now hears from the platform guy who warns him that the cops are on the way.

The not a joyous member of society saunters off down the platform knowing that a train is going to pull in any second, long before even a close by cop could respond.

All entirely too matter of fact.

Makes wonder about tourism in the City, which I now see daily, as I pass through Times Square.

WordPress To Disable Remote Access

WordPress To Disable Remote Access: If this sounds like a pipe dream, it’s worth pointing out that one very popular web service is already employing this strategy, and it works brilliantly. Flickr, Yahoo’s incredibly popular photo sharing site, is built on the very same APIs it makes available to clients. This results in some truly incredible Flickr-enabled applications and web services. And you don’t see any sign of Flickr disabling access to their API, because there’s too much at stake.

If your web service only provides one, first-class API through which all access flows, then you’ve only got one point to secure, you’re likely to have feature parity across interfaces, and the risk of marginalizing one interface is dramatically decreased. [Well put Daniel!]