The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge: The Honorable Mentions

This is a list of other good books that I was considering for the seven days.

Like I told Don Bugg, it was hard to choose just seven.

Most of these books, like Dumas' The Three Musketeers, are really old, but some, like Craig's Missing, Presumed Dead, are relatively new. Some, like White's North American Indian Footwear, are surprisingly still in print, and others, like the 1974 EMS catalog, are long gone. Most of these titles can be found online. Besides Amazon, you can check Goodreads and ThriftBooks. Project Gutenberg is a good source for the classics, such as The Count of Monte Cristo. And it's always a delight to discover any of these books in a real brick-and-mortar bookstore.

There is no significance to the order in which the books appear in this list. Seriously, the order does not matter.

I left off a lot of really good books. I don't know why; that's just the way my brain works. Don't ask me for their titles. If I could remember their titles, they would be on the list. Duh.

There is a quartet of books that doesn't even need to be mentioned: the holy books, the sacred texts, which guide my life. They are superior to any book list I could ever compile.

After that long preface, here's the list of Honorable Mentions.

The Art of Electronics, by Horowitz and Hill
The Complete Walker, by Colin Fletcher
Craft Manual of North American Indian Footwear, by George White
Outdoor Survival Skills, by Larry Dean Olson
The 1974 Eastern Mountain Sports catalog
The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson
Betty Crocker's Cookbook, New and Revised Edition (1979)
The original Harry Potter series, all seven books, by J. K. Rowling
The Chronicles of Narnia, by C. S. Lewis
The Chronicles of Prydain, by Lloyd Alexander
Missing, Presumed Dead, by Craig Depew
The Princess Bride, by William Goldman. The book is great; the movie is even greater
The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Orczy
(also about France, before and after the Revolution:

• The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas
• A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens
• Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo
• The Count of Monte Cristo, also by Alexandre Dumas)

Three programming classics:

• The C Programming Language, by Kernighan and Ritchie
• Who's Afraid of C++, by Steve Heller - that title is obsolete, but his later C++ books are just as good
• Common Lisp: The Language, by Guy Steele

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Seven: the official Boy Scout Handbook

The 7th edition, the one on the left, is from when I was a boy. The 9th edition, the one on the right, is from when I was a Scoutmaster and a Boy Scout dad. I have seen other editions, and IMHO these two are the most solid, most useful, and best written, but my bias is clear.

The journalist and author Peter Applebome wrote a book, Scout's Honor, about his experiences as a Boy Scout dad. Being a reporter and a problem-solver at heart, he takes a long, hard look at what Scouting could be (and should be), compares it to what it is, and makes several really good recommendations for fixing Scouting. 

One of the most interesting things he says is that the Scout Oath and the Scout Law, the moral foundations for Scouting (in the U.S.A.), are rock-solid and it would be a very good thing if all boys (and men!) lived by those tenets. He also says (either himself, or quoting someone) that the Boy Scout Handbook, any edition, is just the kind of "advice to boys" that people have been longing to give to boys today.

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Six: The Organization Guerilla: Playing the Game to Win

This one is going to have a few of you scratching your heads. It's a book I picked up off the 99-cent table at a bookstore, at the beginning of my career. It's easily worth 20 or 30 times what I paid for it.

This is a very cynical book, with practical advice that will save (and maybe even advance) your career, whether you work in a small business or a giant corporation. You may disagree with some of its principles, and you may go "well, duh" at some others, but after reading the book, you will see its truisms everywhere.

Here are three examples:

1. In business, as in politics, nobody ever gives you the real reason for their decisions/actions.

2. If you want to know who has the real power in an organization, watch where the money comes from, and where it goes -- in short, Power Follows Money.

3. I can't put this into a pithy sentence, but there's an entire chapter in the book about the politics behind distribution lists: who do you put in the From, To, Cc and Bcc fields of a memo or, in today's world, an email? There's a whole science behind it. Make sure you get it right.

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Five: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

But first, a joke.

At a major league baseball game, the batter hit a line drive right that caught the second-base umpire right behind the ear. He staggered a bit, but shook it off, and play continued. But as time went on, he began to act a little loopy. He wandered around the field, and eventually started walking in little circles just behind third base, finishing in a beautiful death spiral. He lay there on the ground until a medical crew ran out and hauled him off on a stretcher.

One of the TV commentators turned to the other and said, "We have just witnessed the Decline and Fall of the Roamin' Umpire."

Now to the serious stuff.

The 19th-Century historian Edward Gibbon changed the way history books are written. He also changed the way, and the reasons why, history books are read.

It took me seven years to finish this six-volume masterpiece, a few pages at a time. When I finally closed the last volume, I understood more about the entirety of western civilization than I ever had before.
  

 

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Four: The Sneetches and Other Stories

My own children will tell you that this is one of my favorite read-aloud books.

Did I ever tell you that Mrs. McCave had twenty-three sons and she named them all Dave?

Well, she did. And that wasn't a smart thing to do. You see, ...

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Three; Alvin's Secret Code

This was one of my favorite pre-teen books. After all these years, it's back in print.

I'm delighted. Now a new generation can discover the fun of codes and ciphers.

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day Two: Seven Habits

Stephen R. Covey wrote two powerful books about managing your life and getting along with others, called Spiritual Roots of Human Relations and The Divine Center. Then he distilled the fundamental principles from those books and repackaged them as The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

The seven principles in this book have guided my life, and everything I do, ever since I was a young man.

p.s. Here's a link to a blog post with a concise list of the Seven Habits, for those of you who have asked for it: https://zyzmog.blogspot.com/2012/07/a-great-man-coveys-next-great-adventure.html

The Seven-Day Book Cover Challenge, Day One: The Lord of the Rings

Preface

This began as one of those viral challenges on Facebook: post the covers of seven of your favorite books, one a day, for seven days. On the seventh day, nominate someone and challenge them to do the same.

Multiple people nominated me, so I gave in and posted seven covers. Although the original challenge specified that the covers be posted without explanation or review, I briefly explained and reviewed my choices.

Here's the first one.

---

Day One of the seven-day book challenge.

The hardest thing is going to be picking just seven books.

In fact, I'm going to cheat. This first book is actually one story in four books: The Lord of the Rings, including The Hobbit, written as a preface to the trilogy.

I first encountered The Lord of the Rings as a freshman in college, when I picked up a paperback-edition boxed set for $6.00, on my way back to the dorms for lunch. I disappeared into my room and didn't come out, except for meals, for 72 hours. By then I had finished the books, and my life had been changed.

This is an absorbing adventure, full of deep magic, deep wisdom, and all of the good and evil of humanity, on display against an epic backdrop of epic-backdropness.

If the movies are great, it's because they were built on a great foundation. This is the foundation. Read it to your kids at night. Read it to yourself, over and over. Take notes in the margin. Stick quotations on your bathroom mirror. Let it fill your life with its richness.

Best quotations from the original seven Harry Potter books

This summer, I decided to reread all of the original Harry Potter books. I extracted my favorite quotations from the books and posted on Facebook, in real time, to everyone's delight. (Yes, really.)

Here they are, all in one place – copied and pasted from Facebook.

---

July 7

"It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live."
- Albus Dumbledore

"After all, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."
- Albus Dumbledore again

July 10

"Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain."
- prophetically important advice from Arthur Weasley
See? Dumbledore isn't the only wise old man in the story.

Arthur Weasley's warning is for anyone who uses a smartphone, a computer, or any device connected to the Internet. 

"It is our choices that show who we truly are, far more than our abilities."
- aaaaand we're back to quoting Albus Dumbledore.

July 12

"I don't go looking for trouble," said Harry, nettled. "Trouble usually finds me."

July 14

"Christmas spirit was definitely thin on the ground in the Gryffindor common room that morning."
- An unusual metaphor offered up by J.K. Rowling.

"The consequences of our actions are always so complicated, so diverse, that predicting the future is a very difficult business indeed."
- Albus Dumbledore

"You know, Harry, in a way, you did see your father last night.... You found him inside yourself."
- Dumbledore again

July 18

" it is a strange thing, but when you are dreading something, and would give anything to slow down time, it has a disobliging habit of speeding up."
- J. K. Rowling

"Oh, did I? Just because it's taken you three years to notice, Ron, doesn't mean no one else has spotted I'm a girl!"
- Hermoine Granger, 4th year

July 19

"Her-my-oh-nee," she said slowly and clearly.
"Herm-own-ninny."
"Close enough."

"Powers You Never Knew You Had and What to Do with Them Now You've Wised Up" - Sounds like a good motivational book for some Muggles that I love.

"If you want to know [the measure of a man], take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals."
- Sirius Black

July 23

"Kill the spare."
- Possibly the saddest moment in the first four books. Don't worry; it gets worse.

"Decent people are so easy to manipulate."
- a cynical, but true, observation from Barty Crouch Jr., masquerading as Mad-Eye Moody.

"Understanding is the first step to acceptance, and only with acceptance can there be recovery."
- Albus Dumbledore

"You are blinded by the love of the office you hold, Cornelius! You place too much importance, and you have always done, on the so-called purity of blood! You fail to recognize that it matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be!"
- powerful truths for our time, from the mouth of Albus Dumbledore.
Or from the pen of J. K. Rowling

"You all righ'?" he said gruffly.
"Yeah," said Harry.
"No, yeh're not," said Hagrid. " 'Course yeh're not. But yeh will be."
- words of hope for anyone who has suffered and is slowly healing

"We are only as strong as we are united, as weak as we are divided. Lord Voldemort's gift for spreading discord and enmity is very great. We can fight it only by showing an equally strong bond of friendship and trust. Differences of habit and language are nothing at all if our aims are identical and our hearts are open."
- more wise words for our time. Albus Dumbledore and J. K. Rowling.

"Never mind the Statute of Secrecy now, there's going to be hell to pay anyway, we might as well be hanged for a dragon as an egg."
... and ...
"Well, it's no good crying over spilled potion, I suppose . . . but the cat's among the pixies now."
- the lovable Mrs. Figg

"Who d'you know who's lost a buttock?"
- Tonks!
Remember reading that part out loud?
Wait! There's more:
"Ah well . . . wand still in your jeans? Both buttocks still on? Okay, let's go."

"Dark times lie ahead of us and there will be a time when we must choose between what is easy and what is right."
- Albus Dumbledore
That quotation is from the movie only. In his eulogy for Cedric Diggory, Dumbledore did say, "... if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember ...". But that's not the same thing, and it really doesn't have the same flavor.

July 26

"Shut up, you horrible old hag, shut UP!"
- Sirius Black says hello to his mother

July 27

"Oh, know the perils, read the signs
The warning history shows,
For our Hogwarts is in danger
From external, deadly foes
And we must unite inside her
Or we'll crumble from within
I have told you, I have warned you. . . .
Let the Sorting now begin."
- the Sorting Hat, year 5.

Change "Hogwarts" to "country", drop the last line, and you'll see, again, the timeless wisdom in much of what J. K. Rowling wrote.

"We will be following a carefully structured, theory-centered, Ministry-approved course of defensive magic this year."
- Dolores Umbridge.
Oh please, spare us from anyone's private agenda disguised as "education reform".

"The world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters."
- Sirius Black, and the lovable (and deeply loved) Robyn Chalupa.

"December arrived, bringing with it more snow and a positive avalanche of homework for the fifth years."
- J. K. Rowling loves her wintry metaphors, doesn't she?

"Ron, you are the most insensitive wart I have ever had the misfortune to meet."
And on the same page, everyone's favorite:
"Just because you've got the emotional range of a teaspoon ...."
- Hermoine Granger

But to be honest, Ronald Weasley did have a fair point when he said, in the discussion which led to Hermoine's outburst:
"One person can't feel all that at once, they'd explode."

July 28

"It's like losing a Knut and finding a Galleon, isn't it?"
- Dumbledore

Maybe it's better understood in context. Cornelius Fudge went to Hogwarts, intending to expel Harry Potter, and instead he got the chance to arrest Dumbledore. This was Dumbledore's amused response.

"You know, Minister, I disagree with Dumbledore on many counts ... but you cannot deny he's got style."
- Phineas Nigellus' potrait, to Cornelius Fudge
... although I think Kingsley Shacklebolt said it in the movie

July 29

"... The cloudless sky smiled at itself in the smoothly sparkling lake ..."
- Okay, it looks rather turgid out of context, but this is J. K. Rowling drawing a picture of a perfect day in early June.

"You are quite wrong," said Dumbledore. "Indeed, your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has always been your greatest weakness."

"There is no shame in what you are feeling, Harry. On the contrary . . . the fact that you can feel pain like this is your greatest strength."
- Albus Dumbledore

"Youth cannot know how age thinks and feels. But old men are guilty if they forget what it was to be young."
- Albus Dumbledore

"Indifference and neglect often do more damage than outright dislike."
- advice on both parenting and friendships from Albus Dumbledore

"I'm sorry, Professor," Harry said, holding up his hand and showing her the scars on the back. "But I must not tell lies."
This is only in the movie. Not the book. But it's one of the best lines in the story.

July 30

I've always been intrigued by J. K. Rowling's invention and re-invention of names. This was the day that I decided to write a blog article about the subject.

July 31

Happy birthday to Harry Potter and his creator, J. K. Rowling! I hope you found a good way to celebrate.

"You overlook Dumbledore's greatest weakness: He has to believe the best of people."
- Severus Snape
Then I wish to be weak like Dumbledore.

"And now, Harry, let us step out into the night and pursue that flighty temptress, adventure."
- Albus Dumbledore

"Don't count your owls before they are delivered."
- Albus Dumbledore

August 2

"Once again, you show all the sensitivity of a blunt axe."
- Nearly Headless Nick

"Hmph," snorted Professor McGonagall. "It's high time your grandmother learned to be proud of the grandson she's got, rather than the one she thinks she ought to have."

"Yes," said Harry stiffly.
"Yes, sir."
"There's no need to call me 'sir', Professor."

"From this point forth, we shall be leaving the firm foundation of fact and journeying together through the murky marshes of memory into thickets of wildest guesswork."
Oh, what fun words J. K. Rowling puts into Dumbledore's mouth! In the middle of this complex metaphor we find two alliterative triplets ... and one triplet that she couldn't alliterate on and just gave up.

"Oh, well, that's better than a whack on the nose with a rusty poker."
- Mrs. Cole, keeper of the orphanage in London where Tom Riddle was a child

"Very astute, Harry, but the mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ."
- Dumbledore

August 3

"Dumbledore's man through and through, aren't you, Potter?"
"Yeah, I am," said Harry. "Glad we straightened that out."
And you all know that we'll come back to this one later.

Nine pages later:
"Well, it appears that Rufus found a way to corner you at last."
"He accused me of being 'Dumbledore's man through and through."
"How very rude of him."
"I told him I was."
Dumbledore opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again. Behind Harry, Fawkes the phoenix let out a low, soft, musical cry. To Harry's intense embarrassment, he suddenly realized that Dumbledore's bright, blue eyes looked rather watery, and stared hastily at his own knees. When Dumbledore spoke, however, his voice was quite steady.
"I am very touched, Harry."

"It is one of the irritating things about old teachers. I am afraid that they never forget their young charges' youthful beginnings."
- Albus Dumbledore
I hope that all of my (air bunnies!) "young charges" know how proud I am of them for what they have become.

"Don't you see? Voldemort created his own worst enemy, as tyrants everywhere do! Have you any idea how much tyrants fear the people they repress? All of them realize that, one day, amongst their many victims, there is sure to be one who rises against them and strikes back!"
- Albus Dumbledore

"Age is foolish and forgetful when it underestimates youth."
- Albus Dumbledore repeats himself.

"It is the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more."
These words of Dumbledore gave me understanding and comfort the first time I read them, many years ago.

"You thought I would not weesh to marry him? Or per'aps, you hoped? What do I care how he looks? I am good-looking enough for both of us, I theenk! All these scars show is zat my husband is brave!"
- Fleur Delacour wins everyone else's hearts.
p.s. This sounds best when you read it aloud with a cartoon French accent.

Harry considered him for a moment.
"Released Stan Shunpike yet?"
Scrimgeour turned a nasty purple colour highly reminiscent of Uncle Vernon.
"I see you are --"
"Dumbledore's man through and through," said Harry. "That's right."

August 4

"You did?" said Hermoine, gazing up at Ron. ...
"Always the tone of surprise," he said a little grumpily. ...
That's on page 76. Can't wait to see the other shoe drop!

"So why in the name of Merlin's saggy left --"
- Ronald Weasley
Aaaannd we're back to talking about buttocks.

"It's time you learned some respect!" shouted Scrimgeour.
"It's time you earned it," said Harry.
Later, near the end of Deathly Hallows, it was revealed that the Death Eaters tortured Scrimgeour before they killed him, but he never gave up Harry's location. So he did finally earn some respect.

"Wow!" Ron said, blinking rather rapidly as Hermoine came hurrying toward them. "You look great!"
"Always the tone of surprise," said Hermoine, though she smiled.
 And that's the other shoe dropping. Page 142.

"Where you treasure is, there will your heart be also."
- inscribed on the Dumbledore family tombstone in Godric's Hollow

"Wands are only as powerful as the wizards who use them."
- Hermoine Granger

August 5

"That old berk," muttered Aberforth, taking another swig of mead. "Thought the sun shone out of my brother's every orifice, he did. Well, so did plenty of people, you three included, by the looks of it."

There was a clatter as the basilisk fangs cascaded out of Hermoine's arms. Running at Ron, she flung them around his neck and kissed him full on the mouth. Ron threw away the fangs and broomstick he was holding and responded with such enthusiasm that he lifted Hermoine off her feet.
"Is this the moment?" Harry asked weakly ...
... He raised his voice. "OY! There's a war going on here!"

"This must be between us! Swear it! I cannot bear . . . especially Potter's son . . . I want your word!"
"My word, Severus, that I shall never reveal the best of you?"
- Dumbledore
That one chapter, the one where we watched Snape's memories in the Penseive, turned all seven books inside-out. The whole series became a love story, with Snape and Lily as the main characters

"You see what you expect to see."
- Dumbledore explains confirmation bias to Snape.
I think a few million more people need to understand and watch out for confirmation bias. It really clouds one's judgment. For one thing, it leads to mindless reposting of stupid political memes all over their Facebook pages.

"No," agreed Dumbledore [speaking to Severus]. "You are a braver man than Karkaroff. You know, sometimes I think we Sort too soon. . . ."

"For him?" shouted Snape. "Expecto patronum!"
From the tip of his wand burst the silver doe. ... Dumbledore watched her fly away, and as her silver glow faded he turned back to Snape, and his eyes were full of tears.
"After all this time?"
"Always," said Snape.

"Does it hurt?"
"Dying? Not at all," said Sirius. "Quicker and easier than falling asleep."

Dumbledore smiled at Harry, and Harry stared at him.
"And you knew this? You knew -- all along?"
"I guessed. But my guesses have usually been good," said Dumbledore happily.

"It is a curious thing, Harry, but perhaps those who are best suited for power are those who have never sought it. Those who, like you, have leadership thrust upon them, and take up the mantle because they must, and find to their own surprise that they wear it well."
- Albus Dumbledore

"Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living, and above all, those who live without love."
- Albus Dumbledore

"Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean it is not real?"
- one of my favorites.

"Albus Severus," Harry said quietly, "you were named for two headmasters of Hogwarts. One of them was a Slytherin and he was probably the bravest man I ever knew."
 That's all of them, peeps. I saved the best for last. The end. Love to all of you.

A new calculator. Now you can throw away your TI-84.

Almost exactly eight years ago, I wrote a eulogy to the great Hewlett Packard pocket calculators. The HP calculator product line has limped along since then, a mere shadow of the greatness of the originals. But the ghosts of the great ones, as I pointed out in my article, have received new life, being reincarnated in smartphone apps and PC apps.

A recent article in The Hustle revealed how, after HP slunk away, TI took steps to completely take over the calculator market, lobbied to make TI calculators required items in middle and high school math classes, and, having established a monopoly, jacked up prices on them and made obscene profits.

But the article also points to a new calculator family that may make TI handhelds go the way of ... well, HP handhelds. (And good riddance to them — the TI ones, that is. I always thought the TI devices were products of superior marketing, not superior engineering.)

In May 2011, a company called Desmos announced that they were going to create a new graphing calculator, and it would be implemented as an iOS app and an Android app. Not many years later, they did it — they released a graphing calculator, better than the HP and TI handhelds that had preceded it.

Then they released a powerful scientific calculator sans graphiques, also an improvement on its HP and TI antecedents.

And they released a "test mode" calculator, one that would comply with calculator restrictions on standardized tests.

Because the apps were written in Javascript, it was easy to turn them into web-based apps as well, so you can access them in any web browser.

Desmos has a unique business model. They intend to make money on these apps, but not from the end user. By offering the apps for free to end users, Desmos eliminates the inequity that arose as TI kept raising the prices on their hardware to the point that poorer math students could no longer afford them. Desmos makes money from the textbook publishers and curriculum designers, through very attractive licensing terms.

These calculators are easy to use. When I downloaded the graphing calculator, I didn't even need to watch a video or read a Getting Started guide - I just started punching away, and I had dynamite results in no time. The user interface is clean and uncluttered, and it's almost as intuitive as a wooden pencil. It's also very modest, the only self-promotion being a "powered by desmos" watermark, which is hidden behind the keyboard.

Users have found ways to make some fascinating vector graphics (that means "pictures") on the graphing calculators as well. See the examples near the end of this article.

So feel free to download a Desmos calculator. Enjoy it!

Links:

Graphing calculator
- Apple app store
- Google app store
- Web app

Scientific calculator
- Apple App store
- Google app store
- Web app

Test-mode calculator
- Apple app store
- Google app store: not there yet, as of 2 Oct 2019

And a regular old four-function calculator!
- Just a web app

Screen shots:

I screen-grabbed these from the Google app store. If Desmos, Apple or Google want to yell "copyright infringment!", then I'll delete them.

Here's some of the artwork creative users have come up with.

End notes:

If you're still reading this, you're awesome.

1. I can't believe I didn't find out about Desmos earlier. They announced their intentions and started rounding up funding in May of 2011. I published my article on HP calculators in October 2011.

2. Even though the Desmos calculators are great, Free42 is still my professional go-to calculator. I have it on my phone, on my Windows PCs, and on my Linux PCs. One day, I will own the hardware version of it, the Code Made Flesh, the DM42 by SwissMicros.

3. Desmos is still growing, and their product line is still growing. See their website for other cool stuff.

4.  I don't know if these are programmable calculators, but if they are, then games won't be far behind.

5. Be sure to take the batteries out of your old HP or TI calculator. It's going to be sitting in your drawer, unused, for a very long time, and you don't want the batteries to corrode and ruin it, because if that happens, you won't be able to sell it on eBay in five years when you realize you'll never need it again.

Apotropaic marks and whiteboards

Before I became a 7th-grade math teacher, I had an opportunity to test the waters of public education, by helping to teach an oversized 9th-grade math class. It was a great experience.

If I recall correctly, this class had three girls, not related to each other, named Aylee, Hailey, and Kaylee. I performed additional duties by tutoring one of them after hours. It might have been Aylee, but I can't remember any more.

This girl had a touch of either ADD or OCD, which made it hard for her to concentrate if there were any distractions. That's why she needed one-on-one tutoring. During our tutoring sessions, I would often stand at a whiteboard, marker in hand, explaining mathematical concepts. I had to erase the whiteboard regularly.

The first few times I erased the board, I would commence teaching the next concept, to be interrupted by the sounds of distressed grunting, almost squealing, from Aylee.

I would stop, look at her, and ask, "What?"

She would point to the board and splutter, "That mark! That mark!"

I would look at the board, see a tiny spot that I'd missed, and ask, "What about it?"

"Erase it! Make it go away!"

She could not do anything until the board was completely, perfectly, erased and clean.

So I learned to wipe the board and make it perfectly clean, because naturally I wanted to create an environment in which she could learn better. That's the kind of teacher I am. Was. Whatever.

But after a few sessions, I would wipe the board and make it perfectly clean, then pick up a marker and make a little, tiny, tick mark on the board, before saying "Now, then, ..." just to needle her. It worked every time.

I'm such a meany.

Yep. Just like this.

Arduino Project One: Revived - and another detour into 3D printing

The last installment in the story of my Arduino-controlled garage door opener was in November 2017, almost two years ago. The project stalled, not for any reasons of its own, but because of the distractions of everyday life. Now I can finally get back to it.

I may have changed the hardware, switching from an Arduino to a Raspberry Pi. I have good reasons for that, which I'll tell you in a later post. Today, I want to revisit the subject of 3D modeling software.

You will recall that in my previous article about 3D CAD, I mentioned SolidWorks, Tinkercad, SketchUp, Wings 3D, and Microsoft 3D Builder. I haven't tried SolidWorks, because it costs money and I'm cheap. I tried the other four alternatives, and all of them had serious shortcomings. Tinkercad and 3D Builder were so inadequate that I couldn't even take them seriously. Wings 3D is very powerful, but it has a painful and steep learning curve, and all I want to do is design and 3D-print a small enclosure for my project. SketchUp has the power I need, but some of the features I really want to access are hidden behind a paywall.

So, back to the (ahem) drawing board I went. This time, I found just what I was looking for.

(Yet another detour: I've gotten so used to the Linux command line, that I do a lot of graphics work directly in text files. I mean, I write web pages in raw HTML/Javascript/MarkDown/other stuff. I write formatted and typesetted technical documents in LaTeX. For business and technical graphics, I use GraphViz. I use the command-line version of ImageMagick to manipulate existing images. 

And back in the Good Old Days, I used to use the DOS version of WordPerfect with "Reveal Codes" turned on, and I would edit the codes manually. Also back in the good old days, before WISYWIG editors, and before I learned LaTeX, I used to use troff and Interleaf LISP to create typesetted documents. Oh yeah, and I used to write raw HPGL and Logo to do vector graphics - you know, line drawings. Stone knives and bearskins. Old man's voice: "And we liked it! *ptui*")

All of that, just to say that I'm very comfortable with manipulating text-based input to produce graphical output. So I happened across a beautiful little 3D CAD program called OpenSCAD. 

An OpenSCAD screenshot

Another OpenSCAD screenshot, showing the three panes

OpenSCAD doesn't look like much. It has a window with three panes. On the left is the Editor, where you write the text that defines your part: "Put a cube here. Put a cylinder there. Drill a hole in the cylinder." In the center is the Viewer, where you can see your creation from different angles and at different distances. On the right is the Customizer, a neat little thing you can use to modify your design on the fly without having to rewrite the text in the Editor window.

Creating a model in OpenSCAD is like writing a program. If you've used modern scripting languages like Python or JavaScript, it will feel familiar to you. Pressing F5 or F6 to draw your design is like compiling a program. If you've used compiled languages like C or C++, this will also feel familiar to you. And if you get the programming wrong, OpenSCAD will give you an error message and point you to the line where the error was detected. If you've ever done any programming in your life, I'm certain that this will feel familiar to you.

One of the things that I like best about OpenSCAD is that you can minimize the Editor and Customizer panes, leaving just the Viewer pane, and do your editing in your own favorite editor, in a separate window. Being a Vim fan, I open a terminal window and bang away in Vim. Every time I save the file, OpenSCAD detects that the file has changed, and it computes and displays the new object.

OpenSCAD in use. That's my GVIM editor on the left.
(I'll tell you about the hardware in the enclosure in a later post.)

OpenSCAD can export shapes in a variety of file formats, the most important of which is STL (short for stereolithography, a fancy word for "3D printing"), the format preferred by 3D printing services. Cura LE, from Lulzbot, takes an STL file and converts it into the "slices" required by a 3D printer.

Cura LE (Lulzbot Edition)

Now, here's a new player in the game: FreeCAD. One OpenSCAD user reported that OpenSCAD can occasionally mess up an STL file, and the model will not render properly in Cura. He suggests using FreeCAD as an intermediary between OpenSCAD and Cura.

FreeCAD is a relative newcomer to the 3D design world. It's actually been around since 2002, but it didn't become a serious contender until Release 0.14, in 2014. Even today, at Release 0.18, its makers warn that it's still not ready for prime time, but it's a very good parametric 3D modeling package.

FreeCAD screenshot

(Very technical aside: FreeCAD uses the parametric 3D design paradigm, while OpenSCAD uses the constructive solid geometry (CSG) paradigm. I barely know what those words mean, but I do know that my brain wraps more easily around CSG than parametric design. You may feel differently, and if you do, then you should skip OpenSCAD and use FreeCAD directly. I'm serious.)

So my design path now goes like this:

1. Design the thing using OpenSCAD.

2. Import the SCAD file into FreeCAD, and export it as an STL file.

3. Open the STL file in Cura LE and prepare it for printing.

It works for me. And the price is right. 

If I weren't so cheap, I could spend real money and get one piece of software that does it all for me. But if I had that much money, I'd also buy my own 3D printer. And a OneWheel.

Postscript: Are you wishing I had included a weblink for something that I mentioned? Like SketchUp? Or ImageMagick? Some of these items have links in my previous post on this subject. For the others, you'll have to do a Web search. I'm sorry. I got tired of typing.

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To read the other postings about this project, click here and scroll to the end.

DraftSight is no longer free

Remember when I wrote that article about DraftSight, and I was excited because it was an AutoCAD clone, but it was free? And remember when I wrote some follow-up articles uncovering all of DraftSight's hidden 3D design features, even though Dassault Systèmes told the world that it was just 2D drafting software? Well, DraftSight has grown up.

DraftSight 2018 is the last free version of DraftSight. Starting with DraftSight 2019, all future versions will cost money. Not only that, but all pre-2019 versions of DraftSight will stop working, or "cease to run", as the announcement says, after December 31, 2018.

Click here for the official announcement. (In case that link stops working, here's what it looked like in October 2018.)

Dassault Systèmes are, of course, perfectly justified in charging money for DS. DS is professional-quality software, that's for sure. It was written by hired engineers in a for-profit company, and they deserve to make a profit on it. Not only that, but DS 2019 now officially includes a full complement of 3D design tools; it's billed as "a 2D drafting and 3D design experience."

And, considering the prices of comparable software, DS 2019 may still be a bargain, compared to the competition:

• $100/yr for the Standard version, 2D only, for hobbyists, students and teachers.
• $200/yr for the Professional version, still 2D only.
• $500/yr for the Premium version, which includes the 3D tools.

Are there free alternatives? Well, sure, all of the AutoCAD clones that existed before DraftSight are still there. But the state of the art has progressed since DraftSight was first released in 2011. Now, designers are doing 3D CAD and then converting their creations into data files for 3D printing, CNC milling, and other automated manufacturing processes. But there's still a need for the 2D drawings, and so the higher-quality 3D CAD packages (the ones that cost money) can also generate the 2D drawings from the 3D models.

Next, I'm going to tell you about the new CAD solution that I'm going to use.

In case anybody thinks I consider the Harry Potter movies inferior to the books

In case anybody thinks I consider the Harry Potter movies inferior to the books:

Um ...

Okay, but only a little tiny bit. Read on ...

J. K. Rowling actively participated in all of the movies. They are true to her original vision. They launched the careers of many successful actors and actresses, and boosted the careers of many other people in the movie industry. The movies are, in one word, masterpieces.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with the movies. I LOVE THEM. The sets, the graphics, the special effects, are amazing. The acting, the directing, the music, the props -- all of it is fantastic. Maybe even magical.

Most of the time, the movie dialogue is word for word from the books. And in some instances, the more memorable lines come from the movies, not the books. The storyline in the movies is as captivating as in the books.

There's just one little thing, and I'm at a loss to explain it. I consider it a personal failing. It's this: I can stay up reading the Harry Potter books until 3:30 in the morning. But every time I sit down to watch a Harry Potter movie, I fall asleep in the middle of it.

Every. Single Time.

Names in the Harry Potter world

PREFACE: This is something I've wanted to do for a long time. I'm sure it's better documented elsewhere on the Internet, but this is the result of my journey of discovery in Harry Potter's world. I'll add to the list as time goes on.

J. K. Rowling chose the names, or the proper nouns, in her Harry Potter books very carefully. Some names are inside jokes, some give you additional information about the characters, and some are simply clever plays on words.

If the entire world hadn't already read the books or watched the movies a million times already, I would tag this blog entry with a "SPOILER ALERT!" warning, but you're all way past that. I hope.

• Hogwarts: This one's easy. Reverse the syllables and you get "warthog". Hakuna matata, eh?
• Dumbledore: My understanding is that this is an old English synonym for "bumblebee".
• Malfoy: From the French mal foi, meaning "bad faith". The idiom has the same meaning in French as it does in English, and is a suitable name for a sleazy, conniving family who isn't loyal to anything except itself.
• Longbottom: A compound word that conjures up a funny picture in American English. I believe it has a geographical meaning in British English, like "along the river bottom", but I'm not sure.
• Lovegood: Also an interesting compound word. It reminds me of the Greek name Theophilus and the Latin name Amadeus, both of which mean "love God" — as in "one who loves God". Lovegood could mean "one who loves good" or "one who loves God". 
• Xenophilius: Xenophilius Lovegood is Luna's father. Xeno means "strange", so Xenophilius could mean "one who loves strange things."
• Lily and Petunia Evans: Harry's mother and her sister were both named after flowers.
• It's interesting that none of Harry's other close friends, nor Harry himself, have distinctive first or last names. I mean, "Weasley" is a funny name, but it's not descriptive of the family's facial features or other characteristics.
• Diagon Alley: "diagonally", obviously.
• Knockturn Alley: "nocturnally". Not quite as obvious.
• Grimmauld Place: It's a "grim old place".
• Knight Bus: It doesn't run during the day.
• Pensieve: a respelling of "pensive". Both have to do with thoughts.
• Floo: a respelling of "flue", the pipe that takes smoke away from a fireplace or stove.
• Voldemort: In the second book, "Tom Marvolo Riddle" is revealed to be an anagram for "I am Lord Voldemort" (or the other way around). The French vol de mort means "flight of death" or "flight from death", both of which are appropriate for the character.
• Slytherin: How does a snake move? It slithers. Duh.
• Remus Lupin: This was a good one. Romulus and Remus were the twin babies, raised by a she-wolf, who went on to found the city of Rome and the entire Roman empire. And lupus is Latin for "wolf". Get it?
• Professor Sprout: She teaches Herbology. Insert cute little giggle here. 
• Sybill Trelawney: A one-ell sybil or sibyl was an oracle or prophetess in ancient Greece. Good name for a fortune-telling teacher.
• Libatius Borage: The author of the sixth-year textbook Advanced Potion-Making. "Libatius" comes from the same root as "libation," a fancy word for a drink. "Borage" is a real word, meaning "a herbaceous plant with bright blue flowers and hairy leaves, used medicinally and as a salad green" — in other words, a likely ingredient for a potion.
• Beauxbatons: The French beaux batons means "beautiful sticks" or, colloquially, "beautiful wands". Everybody knows this, right?
• Durmstrang: This is a fun one. It's a twist on the German phrase sturm und drang, literally "storm and stress" and referring to an artistic genre that emphasized violent emotions, often leading to violent, unrestrained action. Remember the noise, the tension, and the danger of the Triwizard Tournament? That's one manifestation of sturm und drang.
  
• Fleur Delacour: The French fleur de la coeur means "flower of the heart". That's a pretty good name for a veela whose mere appearance causes men to fall in love with her.
• Madame Maxime: This is French for "maxim", which doesn't really work, but it might be a shortened form of maximum, which means the same in French and English. "I 'ave nevair been more insulted in my life! 'Alf-giant? Moi? I 'ave — I 'ave big bones!" Right. "The only thing that's got bigger bones than her is a dinosaur," says Ron. Her first name, Olympe, translates to Olympia and refers to Mount Olympus, the home of the ancient Greek gods.
• Sirius Black: This was also a good one. Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky, is known as "the Dog Star" and is part of the constellation Canis Major, or Great Dog. In his animal form, Sirius was a big, black dog.
• The ancient and noble house of Black: This is one of the few wizarding families for whom we have an extensive genealogy. Many, if not all, of the family members are named after a celestial object: a star, a nebula, a constellation. Here are a few: Sirius, Bellatrix, Andromeda, Regulus, Arcturus, Orion, Draco, Scorpius.
• I haven't found Narcissa in the night sky; however, the male name Narcissus belongs to a figure in Greek mythology who was so self-centered that it killed him, and his name and character are preserved in the modern term narcissist.
• I haven't found a celestial source for the excellent wizarding name Nymphadora either.
• Phineas Nigellus Black: Sirius' great-great-great-grandfather, former Hogwarts Headmaster, and the founder of the ancient and noble house of Black. "Nigellus" is a very old English word for "black".
• Kreacher: Say it out loud. Now say "creature" out loud. Clever, no?
• Dolores Umbridge: Dolores is a Spanish name, and is the plural of dolor, meaning "sorrow" or "pain". And "Umbridge", like "Kreacher" is a respelling of another English word, umbrage in this case. Umbrage has an appropriate double meaning: first, "extreme resentment caused by an insult or slight", and second, "comparative darkness that results from the blocking of light rays". It's a great name for such an evil woman. She's one of the people Dumbledore had in mind when he told Harry, "The world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters".
• Sanguini: an Italian vampire. Blood! Blood! Blood!
• Fenrir Greyback: Fenrir is the name of "a monstrous wolf in Norse mythology", according to Wikipedia. Fenrir was also known as Fenris Ulf — a nice crossover for all of you Narnia fans. And Greyback sounds like the perfect surname for a wolf, doesn't it?

Not knowing colloquial British English at all, I'm sure I've missed several other good ones. Feel free to point them out to me in a comment.

The same goes for the Russian or Slavic names, such as Dolohov and Karkaroff. If there's significance buried in those names, I don't get them.

Coleman Stoves: the product that refuses to die.

In an outdoorsy-camping era full of propane camp stoves and lightweight butane backpacking stoves, it may seem that white-gas stoves have fallen out of style.

(In this article, we will not mention Mountain Safety Research. MSR stoves deserve a lot of recognition and a great deal of respect — and their own article on this blog. Later.)

However, there is one old white-gas workhorse that just keeps pulling along. The classic green two-or-three-burner Coleman stove, with the red fuel tank hanging on the front, was introduced as the Model 425 in 1948. It went through several minor revisions over the years, but it always looked like this.

The original design burned kerosene. Later designs burned white gas or Coleman fuel, a petroleum blend made especially for camp stoves and lanterns. White gas burns fast, hot, and clean. It doesn't produce smoke or foul-smelling byproducts.

(Note that, like any burnable fuel, it does produce poisonous carbon monoxide, and therefore it should never be burned indoors or in an enclosed space. Carbon monoxide is clear, colorless, and odorless, so you cannot detect it with your human senses. Always use white gas appliances outdoors, or with adequate ventilation.)

When propane stoves became a Big Thing, demand for white-gas stoves died down, but it didn't die away. The Model 425 is still sold today, although you may find it marketed as the Guide Series ($119 in 2019, direct from Coleman) or the Classic ($131 in 2019, from Amazon).

Why does it keep selling?

Well, for one thing, it just works. It's designed and constructed to be sturdy. It disassembles and packs into a compact (ish) and self-contained unit, for transport and storage.The three-sided windscreen makes it easy to light, and to keep lit, even in a strong wind.

For another thing, the patented Band-a-Blu™ burners are almost trouble-free: they light easily, they burn hot (7500 Btu on the right, 6500 BTU on the left) and reliably, and they are easily regulated. The Band-a-Blu™ burner has been in every stove Coleman has ever designed, even before 1948.

Finally, it's designed for ease of maintenance and repair. Every component can be disassembled and reassembled with simple hand tools. All parts can be cleaned in soapy water or a solvent like alcohol. Replacement parts are widely available and easy to obtain — even Wal-Mart carries them. But most maintenance can be reduced to occasionally cleaning the outer surfaces with a soapy cloth and putting a few drops of lubricating oil in the "OIL" port on the pump.

(Nobody ever oils the pump. Eventually the pump seal wears out and stops pressurizing the tank. Fortunately, the pump is easy to repair or replace.)

Several years ago, Coleman added to their product line by introducing a dual-fuel version of the Model 425. The dual-fuel stoves have silver-grey fuel tanks, while the white gas stoves have red fuel tanks. Other than that, the dual-fuel stove is nearly identical to the Model 425, and in fact, both versions can burn either unleaded gasoline or white gas. I recommend that you stick to white gas, however. It always burns clean, so you may never have to disassemble and de-gunk the valve or generator.

Coleman also used the Model 425's design as the basis for their 2-and-3-burner propane stoves.

The propane version should have killed off the Model 425, but it didn't. For some reason, the white gas design simply has staying power. But if you want the trusty old Model 425 and the convenience of propane, you can now buy a simple adapter, made by Stansport, to convert the Model 425 from white gas to propane. No permanent, irreversible modifications are needed, and the stove can be easily switched back and forth between propane and white gas.

(That Amazon link for the Stansport adapter keeps dying. Bummer.)

And, in case it matters, Coleman stoves are always made in the USA.

---

References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_stove
https://www.amazon.com/Coleman-2-Burner-Classic-Liquid-Stove/dp/B001D22TQC
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleman_fuel
https://www.coleman.com/classic-2-burner-stove/3000003649.html
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=coleman+stove+repair
https://www.coleman.com/coleman-replacementparts-stoves/
https://www.amazon.com/Stansport-185-Propane-Converter/dp/B004RDQT92
https://www.amazon.com/Stansport-Propane-Converter-2-Pack/dp/B07TVJV9P5/

All pictures are shamelessly copied from the above websites.

Kellyanne Conway, a Future Hero

Years from now, it will be revealed that Kellyanne Conway, one of the most despised members of the Trump White House, was actually a hero, in the pattern of the late, great, Severus Snape.

The following is a work of speculative fiction, which I offer in support of the above proposition.

After Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, and KAC was promoted from presidential campaign adviser to counselor to the president, she realized just how unhinged the Man in the White House really was. But she also realized what happened to people in the White House who crossed the President.

She wanted to expose him and to neutralize him. She wanted to save the country, the constitution, and the government. She knew that she could only do that if she kept her hands on the levers of power. That meant she would have to stay in the White House, and to stay in Trump's good graces. So KAC decided that she would become a mole. Here's what she did:

• She became the primary (and most trusted) source of leaks to the press. She made sure that the leaks didn't all go to the same media outlet. She varied the modus operandi of her leaks, their content and format, and even the medium - sometimes paper, sometimes USB thumb drives, sometimes anonymous emails, sometimes FedEx packages with bogus return addresses - so that the leaks couldn't be traced to her.
• She anonymously or confidentially leaked things to Democrats in Congress, to the late John McCain, to the Special Counsel's office, and to the district attorney's office in the Southern District of New York.
• She convinced other insiders to leak as well, sometimes overtly and sometimes more sneakily. She swore these co-conspirators to silence, promising them that she would never betray them. To this day, she has kept her promise and has not revealed their identities.
• She was almost caught once. A major newspaper had put together enough clues to finger her as a leaker. Only her brazen dissembling on national television put an end to that speculation.
• In public, she steadfastly defended the president, so that nobody would ever question her loyalty or suspect that she was betraying him behind his back. She knew that this would expose her to universal ridicule and contempt from the American public. This was a heavy price to pay, one that she was willing to pay for the good of the country.
• Through it all, her only confidant and comfort was her husband, former Trump associate and then Trump antagonist George Conway. Being able to dump on George, in the safety of their home, was the only thing that kept her sane. When she had first had misgivings about Trump, she had talked to George about it, and the two of them had agreed to stand together in opposition to Trump. It was the ultimate "good-cop-bad-cop" act.
• She was the main source of information for George's tweets and his public appearances.
• Sometimes, she would spend hours each night crying on George's shoulder as she dumped the contents of her day on him. He was her greatest strength, and her greatest comfort. As a result, their marriage remained strong - strong enough to withstand Trump's dirty, vicious attacks on the marriage itself.
• Her secret revelations were the key to finally bringing Trump down, although she knew that this could never be revealed. When Trump finally fled the White House in disgrace, KAC followed him out the door, enduring the jeers and taunts and flung detritus of the angry crowd. 
• She continued to defend Trump in her public appearances long afterwards, in order to protect the identities and reputations of other White House insiders who had worked in secrecy to bring the President down.

It wasn't until many years later, that a reporter from the Washington Post, putting together the puzzle that was the Trump years in the White House, noticed that some of the pieces didn't fit. When he rearranged the pieces, a new pattern began to emerge, and he saw hints - glimpses - mere flashes - of Kellyanne Conway's underground activities.

He made discreet inquiries and got corroborating information from many other people, before he approached KAC directly. He asked her if she had been secretly sabotaging Trump all along. At first, she angrily denied the accusation. But then George, still her loving husband and greatest defender, met the reporter at a D.C. bar and told him the whole story, confirming the reporter's suspicions. Then George went home and told his wife that the cat was out of the bag, after which KAC contacted the reporter, reluctantly and tearfully admitting her part in saving the country from a tyrant.

Kellyanne Conway was finally hailed as a hero. Fortunately, it wasn't too late.

Here's a sign that Democrats may be figuring it out

It looks like the more moderate members of the Democratic Party are finally finding a voice, according to this NBC News article. I'll let the article speak for itself. If all Democrats pay attention this article, then they may stand a chance of winning the White House in 2020.

But there's still (unfortunately) a chance that the extreme left factions of the party may frustrate and destroy what should be an easy win.

I could maybe vote for Cory Booker

Now things are beginning to get interesting.

Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) has just entered the 2020 presidential race. He's a Democrat, widely known and highly regarded by fellow Democrats. He appears to have many of the qualities I've been looking for in a presidential candidate. (See "Hey Democrats! You're doing it all wrong!" and "Election 2020: Advice for Democrats".)

It will be interesting to see how this unfolds.

Hey Democrats! You're doing it all wrong!

As the Democratic Party starts spooling up for the 2020 presidential election, one thing is becoming frighteningly clear: they're doing it all wrong.

Come on, Democrats, 2020 should be an easy win for you. It should be like taking candy from a baby — a fat, overgrown, orange-haired baby. It's yours to lose. And from the look of things today, you're going to lose it.

Why? For four main reasons.

1. Too many unqualified candidates. 

This is not secret code for "women." Voters in America will vote for a woman, if it's the right woman. We're looking for someone with demonstrated qualities of wisdom, integrity, leadership, political savvy, and so on, and we don't care if they're male or female. Personally, I'd love to see a presidential election that boiled down to Madeleine Albright vs. Condoleeza Rice. Either way, the American people would be the winners. (... as opposed to Clinton vs. Trump in 2016, when, either way, the American people were the losers.)

No, the candidates who have presented themselves so far are like the hundreds of job applicants that employers see, who have some of the qualifications for the job, but not enough of the critical qualifications and are, therefore, unhireable. I couldn't in good conscience vote for any most of the Democrats who have stepped forward so far. Come on, Democrats. You can give me somebody better than this.

But not Clinton again. Please. That will definitely make me go third-party.

2. Whackadoodle ideas.

You need a more moderate, centrist appeal if you want to take the White House. All of your traditionally Democratic ideas may be good ideas, but they won't get you elected. Some of them, you've been singing about for decades, and they still haven't gotten you elected. Set them aside for now and start concentrating on ideas that appeal to all Americans, not just your base.

3. Why? Because Independents. 

Do the math, you idiots. You're pandering to your party's base and ignoring the independents, who make up one-third of the voters in this country. In 2016, Clinton got (almost) all of the Democrats, Trump got (almost) all of the Republicans, and they split the independent voters right down the middle. If you want to win decisively in 2020, you're going to need significantly more than half of the independent votes.

If you want the independents to vote for you, you'd better give them a really compelling reason to do so.

4. No unity or cohesion in the party.

I'm going to say something good about Hillary Clinton. I really don't want to do it. I don't have any more respect for Clinton than I do for Trump, and I don't want to ignore what Bernie Sanders achieved in 2016. But it's true that one of the things that made Clinton so successful in 2016 (she did win the popular vote, you know) was that the party was unified behind her.

The candidate pool in the Democratic Party is splintered and weak. There's not a strong front-runner today, someone with the power to unify the party. Maybe it's too early for that, but I don't even see anyone who looks promising. Yet.

If the Democrats want to win in 2020, they need to unite behind a strong candidate, or at least behind a strong platform. Right now, there's no unity, at least none that can be perceived from the outside.

Conclusion

Democrats, the 2020 election is yours to lose. You're being handed the presidency on a silver platter. You would have to screw up really, really badly in order to lose against Donald Trump. If he isn't thrown out before November 2020, then the American people will be so sick of him that they will be ready to vote him out — but you have to give us a worthwhile alternative. So far, we haven't seen anybody like that.

One final thought

If it comes down to Trump vs. one of the Democrats who have already declared, right now there's a fifty-fifty chance that I'll vote third party. The losing side will blame me for torpedoing their candidate's chances, but you know what? It will be your fault, not mine. Once again, as in 2016, you will have given me someone I couldn't vote for.

UPDATE, FEB 11, 2019:
It looks like moderate voices in the Democratic Party are starting to make themselves heard. This will solve some of the above problems. It's still the Democrat's election to lose.  

More tools for Linux, Windows, and Mac!

Once again, from the "where have you been all my life?" department, I bring you three useful programs for your computer. One is a document converter, one is an image converter, and one is a souped-up terminal emulator and a Linux shell.

The document converter: Pandoc

The first program is a free-and-open-source document conversion tool called Pandoc. It should have been called DocMagick. Pandoc will convert a document from nearly any format to nearly any other format. It's ridiculously simple to use.

Its only drawback, if you want to look at it that way, is that it's a command-line tool. You don't click on an icon, or right-click on a file icon. No, if you're on Windows you have to open a Command.com window or a PowerShell window. On Mac OS, you have to open a terminal window. Linux? You're already there.

To convert a file from HTML to PDF, for example, you type this command:

    pandoc thisfile.html -o thisfile.pdf

All done!

Pandoc also makes slide shows in PDF, PowerPoint, and several other formats.

Pandoc supports 27 input file formats, and 47 output file formats. It has been around for 12 years. Go to pandoc.org to read more about pandoc and to download it for your Linux, Windows, or Mac OS box.

The image converter: ImageMagick

The second program is an image conversion tool called ImageMagick. ImageMagick will convert an image from nearly any format to nearly any other format - over 200 different file formats. What's more, it will process, filter, and enhance your image while it's at it. And even more, it can be used to create image files on its own.

Like pandoc, ImageMagick is a command-line-only tool (No longer true! Keep reading). Many people will prefer a GUI-oriented tool like PhotoShop. (Aside: For those who can't afford PhotoShop, there are many alternatives. I recommend Paint.NET if you have Windows, or Krita for Linux, Mac OS, and Windows.) With a GUI-oriented tool, you open a graphics file, do your editing, and then select Export or Save As to save it in a different format.

STOP THE PRESSES! ImageMagick now has a GUI! Keep reading ...

ImageMagick is not as intuitive as the GUI-oriented products, but it's still pretty easy to use. To convert a file from JPG to PNG, for example, you type this command:

    convert thisfile.jpg thisfile.png

or, if you have a newer version of ImageMagick installed:

    magick thisfile.jpg thisfile.png

All done!

To use the GUI instead of the command line, instead of using the 'convert' or 'magick' command, type this simple command:

    display

ImageMagick has been around for a long time: 28 years, according to Wikipedia. It is free-and-open-source software. Go to imagemagick.org to read more about ImageMagick and to download it for your Linux, Windows, or Mac OS box.

The terminal emulator: MobaXterm

The third program is a variation on the good old Microsoft Windows terminal emulator. If you are old enough to remember 5 1/4-inch floppy disks, you will remember Procomm and its variants, which ruled the roost for many years. If you're old enough to remember Windows XP, you will remember HyperTerm, which came free with Windows for many years. When Procomm disappeared, and Microsoft stopped including HyperTerm in Windows, freeware like PuTTY and TeraTerm filled the void in the market.

I recently discovered a free (but not open-source) alternative for Windows that is better than any of today's alternatives. Created by the French software firm Mobatek, MobaXterm is a Windows-based terminal emulator that supports direct serial connection, SSH, and much, much more. With its built-in X11 server, you can remotely log into a Linux system, run a graphical program (like, for demonstration purposes, xclock) and see it running on your Windows display.

Having the X11 server in MobaXterm has eliminated the need to run a VNC server on my remote machines and a VNC client on my PC. Life is much simpler.

Bonus: MobaXterm gives you Linux!

But MobaXterm isn't just a terminal emulator. Incorporating both Cygwin and BusyBox into its programming,  MobaXterm adds a Linux command line to your Windows PC.

I know that Windows 10 offers the Windows Subsystem for Linux, a good way to run native Linux alongside Windows. But this is a great alternative, especially if your main OS will remain Windows and you only need Linux as an adjunct. I've been running Cygwin for years, so I'm very comfortable with MobaXterm.

Mobatek also offers a Professional version of MobaXterm, for a modest annual subscription. MobaXterm can run multiple sessions at once, each in its own tab, making it easy to switch between them. The free version will save up to 12 configurations; the Professional version will allow you to save a virtually unlimited number of configurations.

MobaXterm is 10 years old and, and it is being actively maintained and improved. Even if you're happy with the Windows terminal emulator you're using right now, I highly recommend that you go to the MobaXterm website, read about it, download it, and give it a try. You won't be sorry.