automation - Not so obvious

A turquoise background with black text. The text reads "Silde decks: How nice to be able to make them with minimal effort and some bash scripting :D"

automation

Friday bonus: Slide decks

Today's Friday bonus describes how I've (partially out of spite) automated my process for making slide decks. All with good, old-fashioned, artisan Linux tools.

Black and white photo of a large building. On its side, there is a gantry and a ramp. Below the ramp, cars typical of the early-20th century, surrounded by workers.

work

Understanding work (part 2)

In part two of "Understanding work," a brief trip into productivity; the Luddites were onto something; and half the world now works in the tertiary sector. What happens when the quest for higher productivity comes for the service jobs? (Spoiler: it already has.)

A photo of a smart garbage can on a street, surrounded by garbage. The red indicator light on the garbage can indicates that it is locked.

cities

Anatomy of a smart garbage can

Everyday things are collecting and transmitting data. This was one of the promises of the Internet of Things. A humble member of the IoT, the smart garbage can is becoming a ubiquitous street appliance. So what exactly is this thing?

A horse points its nose at a card with the number "0" on it, having selected that card from a line of other number cards.

automation

Stupid smart things

Automation does not, by its nature, need to be bad. Can we disentangle ourselves from automation that disrespects user rights and makes heavy use of computation? I make the argument for the importance and value of "stupid smart things."