Paul Ganssle @pganssle@qoto.org

Apparently the OSI approved the Unlicense as a "Special Purpose" license a few months ago, but I do not see what the special purpose is anywhere on their main site. There's some more background in this mailing list post:

https://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review_lists.opensource.org/2020-June/004890.html

I'm still not clear what the "special purpose" is that they're suggesting, though. Seems like they don't want to be seen recommending it because it's somewhat weirdly drafted and is partially a public domain dedication.

Maybe it came out of a conversation with a frustrated just-arrived time traveler:

"What's today?"
"Thursday"
"No, the date!"
"August 27th."
"Be more specific!"
"Uh... 12:34:56? AM? Central standard time?"
"THE YEAR, MAN!"
"Oh, 2020."

Also, who picked that as the default date format? Was it someone trying to make American MM-DD-YY formats look sane?

Day of week, then month, then day of month, then time, then time zone indicator *then* year.

For me "CST" maps to "Central Standard Time" (UTC-5) rather than Cuba (UTC-6) or China (UTC+8):

$ TZ=UTC date --date="Thu Aug 27 12:34:56 AM CST 2020" --iso=min
2020-08-27T06:34+00:00

Interestingly, that time doesn't exist in America/Chicago, but it still applies UTC-5!

Interesting, #GNU `date` seems to support dates with ambiguous three-letter offsets, though it's unclear how it decides to disambiguate them. Looks like "IST" defaults to "India Standard Time":

$ TZ=UTC date --iso=m --date="Thu Aug 27 12:34:56 AM IST 2020"
2020-08-26T19:04+00:00

Oh man, I just found out that many TVs have a built-in setting (called CEC) for controlling devices and that you can control your OSMC Raspberry Pi with your TV remote by just enabling it. I could have had a single unified remote for YEARS!

https://www.instructables.com/id/Raspberry-Pi-Remote-For-Free/

Warning from @try_osmc@twitter.com, though:

"On paper, it's great, but due to different implementations by AV equipment manufacturers, it can also cause a lot of problems."

I had been delaying getting back into electronics and wearables until after the boy is a bit older (he's 2.5 now), but I think for the right project he might be ready to take some pride in helping me build something already.

Very disappointed that my workbench didn't come when they said it would (Friday). My son was excited to put it together with me.

Anyone have recommendations for a TV where it's relatively easy to physically disable the wifi (and where doing so won't degrade the user experience for a normal user who doesn't care about the "smart" features)?

We need a new TV and apparently you can't just get normal TVs anymore.

Interesting question from here: https://kenta.blogspot.com/2020/08/kpmswzpc-unlimited-bat.html

"What would baseball bats look like if rules regarding their shape, weight, and composition were lifted?"

(I find this blog mildly frustrating in that it poses many interesting questions but with little discussion.)

Word of the Day:

syr·up·ti·tious, adj. secretly adding or attempting to add syrup to something.

"to avoid judgmental looks, I'm always very syruptitious when flavoring my waffles"

Big exciting day coming up: It's almost the randomly chosen day that Google thinks is my birthday! I think I'll be 47 (so hard to keep track once you hit 40).

"Doctor, it hurts when I invoke setup.py install."
"Stop doing that then!"

(Seriously, always use pip install, never setup.py install)

A very annoying auto-antonym: westerly (or easterly, or other direction + erly words).

It means either "moving towards the west" or "coming from the west". The westerly winds take you east.

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/westerly

That awkward moment when you get to your desk and your co-worker has borrowed your chair, WFH edition.

Looking for a podcast to listen to while grilling (US), pining for past glory (UK), or going about your normal business (everyone else)?

This 4th of July, I'm on @TalkPython talking about #Python datetimes and time zones! Check it out:

https://talkpython.fm/episodes/show/271/unlock-the-mysteries-of-time-pythons-datetime-that-is