We have a couple of split air conditioners. One of them is reasonably old (1987 model) and when we bought the place it came without a remote. We will eventually have to redo the roof and will replace all ACs with more modern and hopefully higher efficiency models. Until then, however, I was hoping to build a remote for this unit – and yes, we have tried just about every existing universal remote model, which turn out not to be so “universal.” This is the outside of the unitAnd here is the par...

We have a couple of split air conditioners. One of them is reasonably old (1987 model) and when we bought the place it came without a remote. We will eventually have to redo the roof and will replace all ACs with more modern and hopefully higher efficiency models. Until then, however, I was hoping to build a remote for this unit – and yes, we have tried just about every existing universal remote model, which turn out not to be so “universal.” This is the outside of the unitAnd here is the par...

And now for something different: just some pragmatic advice. You should run all hands meetings in your company. They are a key bonding and communication opportunity. You can have them until you are quite large – for instance, Twilio, which as gone public, still does them. Here is the key though: make sure to solicit questions and topics ahead of time. You should even make it possible for employees to do so anonymously. For some people that seems obvious but I have seen quite a few situations ...

And now for something different: just some pragmatic advice. You should run all hands meetings in your company. They are a key bonding and communication opportunity. You can have them until you are quite large – for instance, Twilio, which as gone public, still does them. Here is the key though: make sure to solicit questions and topics ahead of time. You should even make it possible for employees to do so anonymously. For some people that seems obvious but I have seen quite a few situations ...

My blog Continuations has been on Tumblr since I started writing it a bit over eight years ago. But now I am seriously considering moving away from Tumblr. There have always been limitations, such as difficulty embedding certain types of content, but I generally worked around those. I liked being part of a network and the positive attitude that Tumblr was promoting – one of the reasons they stayed away from comments, but did support Disqus for people like myself who wanted comments. Now, howe...

My blog Continuations has been on Tumblr since I started writing it a bit over eight years ago. But now I am seriously considering moving away from Tumblr. There have always been limitations, such as difficulty embedding certain types of content, but I generally worked around those. I liked being part of a network and the positive attitude that Tumblr was promoting – one of the reasons they stayed away from comments, but did support Disqus for people like myself who wanted comments. Now, howe...

I have written and talked about the need for a “right to be represented by a bot.” By a bot here I mean software that runs on my behalf as an enduser and mediates my interactions with online services. In the web world, the browser is such as bot. For instance, I can run an ad blocker which I instruct on which parts of a site to show to me. I can also run something like 1Password that manages my security. I could use a custom bot to say keep an automatic personal copy of all the images and tex...

I have written and talked about the need for a “right to be represented by a bot.” By a bot here I mean software that runs on my behalf as an enduser and mediates my interactions with online services. In the web world, the browser is such as bot. For instance, I can run an ad blocker which I instruct on which parts of a site to show to me. I can also run something like 1Password that manages my security. I could use a custom bot to say keep an automatic personal copy of all the images and tex...

I love programming. I also encourage people to learn some programming because (a) it is a useful way of thinking and (b) much of the world will be programmable. Here is a quick example that I just encountered when I prepared yesterday’s Tech Tuesday Index. I had a document with links to every post looking like this:But what I really wanted were the post titles as the text for each link. Now I could have manually gone and followed each link, copied the post title and then replaced the text. Te...

I love programming. I also encourage people to learn some programming because (a) it is a useful way of thinking and (b) much of the world will be programmable. Here is a quick example that I just encountered when I prepared yesterday’s Tech Tuesday Index. I had a document with links to every post looking like this:But what I really wanted were the post titles as the text for each link. Now I could have manually gone and followed each link, copied the post title and then replaced the text. Te...

I am about to start a new series (on uncertainty) and so I decided it would be fun to go back and index all the old Tech Tuesday posts. Here is is (also available as a Google Document): Components of ComputingComputing’s Building Blocks (Overview) Of Bits and Bytes (Binary Number System) A First Look at the Central Processing Unit (CPU) Main Memory (Dumb, Lazy and Slow) Storage (Oh My, How It Has Grown) Networking (No Computer is an Island) Input/Output (Interrupts and Queues) Operating Syste...

I am about to start a new series (on uncertainty) and so I decided it would be fun to go back and index all the old Tech Tuesday posts. Here is is (also available as a Google Document): Components of ComputingComputing’s Building Blocks (Overview) Of Bits and Bytes (Binary Number System) A First Look at the Central Processing Unit (CPU) Main Memory (Dumb, Lazy and Slow) Storage (Oh My, How It Has Grown) Networking (No Computer is an Island) Input/Output (Interrupts and Queues) Operating Syste...

I recently ordered and received a developer edition of Microsoft’s Hololens. This is me looking goofy wearing it at the USV office:TL;DR: the Hololens is a well executed preview of an amazing augmented reality future. Compared to the Vive and Oculus (VR, I know the difference) the Hololens ships fully ready to go. Unbox, put on your head and go. It even arrived with its batteries charged. Nothing to download onto a separate computer. No cables for tethering. Just put the Hololens on and go. S...

I recently ordered and received a developer edition of Microsoft’s Hololens. This is me looking goofy wearing it at the USV office:TL;DR: the Hololens is a well executed preview of an amazing augmented reality future. Compared to the Vive and Oculus (VR, I know the difference) the Hololens ships fully ready to go. Unbox, put on your head and go. It even arrived with its batteries charged. Nothing to download onto a separate computer. No cables for tethering. Just put the Hololens on and go. S...

Nearly 20 years ago I met a doctor who had built a diagnosis system for brain related conditions. When he showed it to me I was completely blown away. You would enter some symptoms and the system would display a list of possible diagnoses. If you then entered test results it narrowed down the diagnoses – in fact it was able to tell you which test would most help you at this differential step! The whole thing ran on a laptop. So what was the catch? Well it turned out that it had taken him year...

Nearly 20 years ago I met a doctor who had built a diagnosis system for brain related conditions. When he showed it to me I was completely blown away. You would enter some symptoms and the system would display a list of possible diagnoses. If you then entered test results it narrowed down the diagnoses – in fact it was able to tell you which test would most help you at this differential step! The whole thing ran on a laptop. So what was the catch? Well it turned out that it had taken him year...

Yesterday evening our son and I were taking a train back from Long Island on the LIRR and the trip was a great illustration of how decrepit our infrastructure is. About four minutes before train departure there was an announcement that the train was running on time. All good and we were looking forward to getting some work done on the train. Then three minutes before departure, i.e., just one minute later, a different announcer came back on to say that the train was at least 15 minutes delaye...

Yesterday evening our son and I were taking a train back from Long Island on the LIRR and the trip was a great illustration of how decrepit our infrastructure is. About four minutes before train departure there was an announcement that the train was running on time. All good and we were looking forward to getting some work done on the train. Then three minutes before departure, i.e., just one minute later, a different announcer came back on to say that the train was at least 15 minutes delaye...

I have written repeatedly about why I don’t think “encrypt all things” is the right answer for constructing a democratic society going forward. I am, however, a fan of the idea to “sign all things.” What I mean by this is that ideally all my emails, blog posts, etc. would be automatically digitally signed using a private key. Anyone with the corresponding public key could then verify that I really did write this email or post. Why does this matter? Because with digital tools it is also incred...

I have written repeatedly about why I don’t think “encrypt all things” is the right answer for constructing a democratic society going forward. I am, however, a fan of the idea to “sign all things.” What I mean by this is that ideally all my emails, blog posts, etc. would be automatically digitally signed using a private key. Anyone with the corresponding public key could then verify that I really did write this email or post. Why does this matter? Because with digital tools it is also incred...