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.

2019 In The Rearview

From the desk of the LampLight editor:

2019 wasn’t a good year here. I’m not going to go into the details and sad stories, but I am going to apologize that it affected LampLight, but for the readers who were waiting for the issue, and the writers whose submissions were horribly delayed.

For the readers: The September issue came out in November. We are pushing the December issue to January, both to give a little breathing room and to ensure all the stories will be eligible for ‘…of the year’ type awards. After that, we will be back on schedule.

Issue 8.1 is amazing, by the way. I hope you enjoy it.

For the writers: all the submissions from March-May of 2019 have been read, and responded to. Please check your inboxes or Submittable account for replies. Again, I am sorry this took so long.

I made the decision once I got behind to still take the time and diligence with each submission as I normally would, rather than try to cut corners to finish faster.

For those who submitted in October – December of 2019, I’m getting to your submissions now, and the response time should be much better this go-round.

We’ll have five issues of LampLight in 2020. We will have some great classics, starting with version of Frankenstein that shows the differences between the 1818 and 1831 editions. We are going to publish some poetry, that I am particularly excited about. And that’s just the beginning.

2020, here we come.