On Blogging

Blogging¹ is one of those thing that I’ve always enjoyed. Setting up a website and having little notes or thoughts about whatever; connecting with other writers to see how they were; having an online space that was mine.

But something that happened when blogs went from this thing we did online for a circle of friends or a web ring, or friend connection, or however things were linked, to being a part of YOUR BRAND.

And if you are going to BLOG as a part of YOUR BRAND you should make sure to SAY SOMETHING.

And so I have dozens of half finished drafts on my computer where I started typing and then stopped when I thought ‘who is going to read this?’ Which is, despite the public nature of the medium, not the center of blogging. The blogger is the center of the blogging.

Add on that—despite this self-perception—I don’t really read blogs that SAY SOMETHING. I much prefer the more raw, personal side of blogging.

Here is a thing I don’t know how to say.

Here is a day I had that isn’t important.

Here is a picture I made, I like it!

“Innocent” isn’t quite the right word for this nostalgia. Perhaps “un-filtered” like the cider in front of me is the word.

We weren’t building a brand. We were just being.

And in being, we connected.

I’ve never been a fan of the word “blog,” even “online diary” was better in my mind ↩︎

On Open Source and Syncing

I’ve been wanting to dip my toes into the open source world for a long time. I certainly have used open source projects for a long time. I was an active supporter of NeoOffice, the OpenOffice.org port for Mac, helping to write documentation, and answering support questions. It was fun.

This time I am the one writing the code. This is my first project, but from the looks of my hard drive this won’t be my last.

Introducing sync.applescript

Makes it sound like something spectacular, no? This one is for you Mac users who want to have files backed up / synced onto a thumb drive. It is designed to be run from the destination location and sync files found elsewhere.

So, for example, I keep a copy on a thumb drive. I plug in the drive, run the application and it updates folders on the drive to match the folders on my computer—updating the changed files and deleting the deleted files.

It is a one-way sync, updating directory with any changes in directory, filling a backup role, rather than a true sync.

It uses AppleScript to run a command line utility call rsync to do so.

I’ve set it up on GitHub for anyone who wants it.

https://github.com/jakeosx/sync-applescript

How Do I use that?

Go to the GitHub page, download the AppleScript file, put it in the directory you want your files to be copied to (so I put mine on the thumb drive). Read the README. It has all the answers you want!

Basically, you add in the path to the folders you want to copy, and tell it if your drive is FAT32/exFAT or no.

Seriously, I spent a lot of time on that README, and it should have all the answers!

It is also released under the GPL3, so feel free to copy, use, pass it around, modify as you wish as per that license!

WARNING

NEVER TEST SHIT YOU FIND ON THE INTERNET ON LIVE DATA! Try this out with a copied folder to make sure you get it. It isn’t set up to delete anything on the origin folder, but will on your synced folder. Play with a few files and see how it works before you set it up for real.

BACK UP YOUR SHIT. ALL OF IT. And yes, that is the intent of this program, but still.

On Contemplation and the Public Domain

I was reading On Haiku, by Hiroaki Sato this past January (highly recommended!), and in it Sato mentioned an article published in 1923, On the Method of Practicing Concentration and Contemplation translated by Kakuso Okakura, which was the first complete instructions for zazen translated into English.

At the time, it was January 2019, which was different from the previous 20 or so years in an important way—public domain had advanced one year, which meant that works published in 1923 were now public domain.

Well! I went looking for it on a whim and found a scanned copy online and began the process of typing it up…

(then 2019 happened. sigh)

AND then, in December, I pulled it back out and finished typing it up. It’s about 12,000 words, featuring the translation by Kakuso Okakura, and a forward from William Sturgis Bigelow.

So, here it is, in ebook form, the pamphlet. On the Method of Practicing Concentration and Contemplation by Chi Ki, translated by Kakuso Okakura.

ePub – Mobi

On the Method of Practicing Concentration and Contemplation

Chi Ki (Chik I)

A Monk of Shuzenji (Hsiutanszu) Monastery of Tendai (Tient’ai) Moutain

Translated by Kakuso Okakura

with a Prefatory Note by William Sturgis Bigelow

note: For the third-person singular pronoun, the translator used he/him, which would have been the proper style at the time. This has been changed the pronouns to they/them to reflect modern style guides. The preface remains unchanged.