A few months ago, a coworker (unwittingly) sent me down a keyboard-enthusiast rabbit-hole. My frenetic journey culminated in purchasing the Happy Hacking Keyboard Professional Hybrid Type-S, the fanciest model in the Happy Hacking Keyboard (“HHKB”) family of keyboards. I though I’d share my thoughts and impressions with you, in case you’re curious and want to learn more. My Rating of the HHKB You can click on the categories in the table below to jump to the relevant section in this post. ...

• mechanical keyboards

I Got an Instant Pot Last year, I picked up an Instant Pot multi cooker, thinking it would simplify cooking dinner on weeknights. Now that I’ve owned and used it for about 9 months, I’d like to share what I like about it, and what I don’t. For the record, I’m using the basic Instant Pot Duo 6-quart model. Capabilities I Use The Instant Pot is sort of like a Dutch Oven — it’s a thick-bottomed steel pot that can sauté, steam, and pressure cook food. And, much like a Dutch Oven, it’s very handy that quite a few recipes can be made in a single pot, which simplifies preparation and cleanup. ...

• cooking

Have you ever known that you wanted to write about something, but weren’t sure where to start? I’ve often experienced that when writing for this very blog. I’ll have a topic like programming or cooking that I want to share a thought about, and get stuck… starting. That’s one of the reasons I haven’t been blogging as often as I’d have liked to. In order to tackle this “writer’s block”, I’m going to try changing my blogging approach in three related ways: setting explicit writing goals, taking notes towards those ends, and not rushing the writing process. ...

• tiddlywiki
• writing
• meta

Using a TiddlyWiki is a tale of two cities: Each TiddlyWiki document is a single HTML file that contains 100% of its own source code and data and is compatible with all modern browsers (and operating systems). Therefore, opening and reading a TiddlyWiki couldn’t be simpler. On the other hand, editing TiddlyWiki is a bit messy if done without a plugin. With a plugin, editing and saving a TiddlyWiki happens “in-place”, the same as with a Microsoft Word document (or the like). If I edit mytiddlywiki.html from my Downloads folder, I can save back to mytiddlywiki.html in my Downloads folder. Without a plugin, editing and saving a TiddlyWiki spits out a _clone of the modified wiki. If I edit mytiddlywiki.html from my Downloads folder, I can save mytiddlywiki copy.html, but I won’t be able to save back to mytiddlywiki.html. For that reason, serious users of TiddlyWiki should adopt an app or plugin which allows saving TiddlyWikis in-place. ...

• tiddlywiki

I continue to be fascinated by the world of TiddlyWiki, and have been trying to scratch an itch in my mind by learning more about it. One of the deeper aspects of TiddlyWiki, called out by its creator Jeremy Ruston (https://jermolene.com/), is that TiddlyWiki can be leveraged by non-software-developers to craft ad-hoc, well-tailored informational “apps”. This is very similar to how non-software-developers have used Microsoft Excel’s spreadsheet-scripting to do likewise in business, crafting custom programs to meet a need, without paying for software developers to get into the mix. And this is bolstered by how TiddlyWiki is entirely self contained (see Playing with TiddlyWiki). ...

• tiddlywiki