Weblog Update: Slightly Off Kilter #2273, 2274, 2275, 2276, 2279, 2281, 2283, 2285, 2286, 2287

[Vicki Brown]

Recent updates to Slightly Off Kilter weblog:

"OMG My IMAP Mailboxes are Gone!"
Posted on 20151205 by Vicki Brown
In category: SciTech,Trivial Pursuits

I have never cared for the "store mail on the server" model of IMAP.
Disliking this from an academic standpoint, I had avoided using IMAP
as much as possible. However, I recently decided that I wanted to use
email on both my desktop and my laptop.

Thanks to recommendations from knowledgeable friends and acquaintances
who insisted that IMAP was really the only way to keep my mail clients
in synch on multiple computers, I grudgingly converted to IMAP a few
weeks ago. And it was working.

Mail was being delivered to ~/Maildir and I was getting it on both
machines. I set up server-based mailboxes and moved all of my "On my
Mac" messages to the server. Filed messages were now accessible in
both locations. All was fine.

But then, I decided to improve things.

[...Pause while the reader considers the ramifications of that
statement and either gasps, sighs, or chortles...] ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002273.html

"Happy Holidays (or What's in a Name?)"
Posted on 20151222 by Vicki Brown
In category: Special Interests

hol·i·day noun - a day of festivity or recreation when no work is
done.
characteristic of a holiday; festive.

etymology - Old English hāligdæg ‘holy day.’

Happy holiday tree

A group I'm in has been planning a holiday message to send to our
members. After several iterations, one member commented that she
thought the design was "still too religious". The member is Jewish.

I wasn't going to argue, but personally, I don't see religion here.
What I do see is an assumption... an assumption that irks me. ** ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002274.html

"Telecommuting May Perpetuate Increased Telecommuting"
Posted on 20160105 by Vicki Brown
In category: Special Interests,World of Work

A Twitter friend shared a NYT article, yesterday, entitled
Telecommuting Can Make the Office a Lonely Place, a Study Says. The
<meta description...> tag on this article is "New research finds that
off-site work can disrupt teamwork, alienate people who remain in the
office and perpetuate increased telecommuting."

Gosh.

Another article about the same survey, published late last year in
Business News Daily, is entitled Is Having Too Many Remote Workers Bad
for Business?

Is having "too many" remote workers bad for business? I think the
answer is... no. It may be "lonely" for some, but I see nothing in
either article to indicate that increased remote work is bad for
business. Many companies have made remote teams a cornerstone of their
business model.

I'm afraid that my sympathy for this study is essentially
non-existent. Also, I want the name of the unnamed "Fortune 100
Company in Silicon Valley" (singular) on which the study was based.

I want to apply for a job. ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002275.html

"Cut To Shape, File to Fit"
Posted on 20160218 by Vicki Brown
In category: Trivial Pursuits

Potlid I bought a large glass jar for a project the other day at a
thrift shop. There was no matching lid, but there was a tempered glass
pot lid that almost fit.

The lid looked a lot like the first photo - tempered glass with a
screw-in handle, a metal rim, and a 1/4-5/16" metal "collar".

With the collar, the lid was almost the same diameter as the top of
the jar. This meant that it sat on the rim of the jar and wasn't very
stable in that orientation. ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002276.html

"AntiSpam Processing with Mac OS X Server for Mail"
Posted on 20160219 by Vicki Brown
In category: Trivial Pursuits,WebTech

We upgraded cfcl.com to Mac OS X Yosemite in December, 2015,
installing OS X Server v. 5.0 to handle DNS, Mail, and Web services.
We'd been handling Mail services "manually" using postfix,
SpamAssassin, and MailServe (by Cutedge Systems) for several years, so
there was a bit of a learning curve in switching over to OS X Server.
Server uses SpamAssassin (SA), so that was familiar, but X Server runs
SA from underneath amavisd.

I happened to mention amavisd and SA today, in Twitter. A friend asked
me for details. I obliged by email, then thought, "I should blog this,
in case anyone else ever asks".

Read more in our CFCL MOTD blog ... ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002279.html

"Osmoprep"
Posted on 20160323 by Vicki Brown
In category: Odd Corners

At some point, usually after you hit 50 years of age, your doctor will
recommend a colonoscopy.

Colonoscopy is a test that allows your doctor to look at the inner
lining of your large intestine (rectum and colon), [using] a thin,
flexible tube called a colonoscope. A colonoscopy helps find
ulcers, colon polyps, tumors, and areas of inflammation or
bleeding.

Before this test, you will need to clean out your colon (colon
prep). Colon prep takes 1 to 2 days, depending on which type of
prep your doctor recommends. Some preps may be taken the evening
before the test. For many people, the prep is worse than the test.
- webmd.com

For many people, the prep is worse than the test. Especially if you go
the "drink the nasty liquid" route. However, there is a better way. We
found it 5 years ago. ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002281.html

"No, You've Already Got"
Posted on 20160411 by Vicki Brown
In category: Random Thoughts

"Ask", advises the wise old sage. "'No', you've already got!"

Unfortunately, the 'No' you've got is a softer, gentler 'no'. If you
don't ask, there's still the possibility that perhaps, just maybe, a
'no' could become 'yes'. Once you've asked... once you've received a
firm, real-world 'No', that avenue is closed.

"Fear causes hesitation and hesitation will cause your worst fears
to come true."
~Patrick Swayze

To ask? Or not to ask? That is the question. ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002283.html

"Walking in Dreams"
Posted on 20160414 by Vicki Brown
In category: Random Thoughts

"Have you ever woken up from one of your dreams and thought “WTF was
that?”

Well, yeah. Most mornings...

I read an article a couple of days ago: What You Should Know About
Your Dreams. There were several points about it that I took issue
with, starting with the first item: "You don’t walk in dreams."

ORLY? ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002285.html

"Discounting Calories"
Posted on 20160415 by Vicki Brown
In category: Random Thoughts

I have decided that I no longer believe in calories. I believe in the
definition, of course, thats indisputable. But what does it have to do
with food?

A calorie, scientifically speaking, is a unit that is used to measure
energy. One calorie is the amount of energy needed to raise the
temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree Celsius. The Calorie
(capital C) used in talking about food is actually a kilocalorie, or
1,000 (little c) calories. A Calorie (kcal) is the amount of energy
needed to raise the temperature of 1 kilogram of water 1 degree
Celsius.

So, what does heating water have to do with eating, weight gain,
weight loss, etc? And how do people determine the Calories on a
nutritional label? ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002286.html

"rm -rf *"
Posted on 20160416 by Vicki Brown
In category: Noteworthy,Random Thoughts

Man accidentally 'deletes his entire company' with one line of bad
code

article in The Independent, 15 April 2016, /via Gene Spafford in
Twitter.

ScreenShot2016 04 16 13 56 10

"The problem command was "rm -rf": a basic piece of code that will
delete everything it is told to."

I love this stuff. It proves we're human. (And also, EVERYTHING needs
multiple off-site backups!)

I think this is almost a rite of passage for some of us. At least it
tends to stop (or slow down) after it removes /bin/rm... and most of
us only wipe out our own disk. (Extra credit if you ran it from a
script and didn't test it sufficiently first with printf or echo.) ...

Read this entry on the web at:
http://cfcl.com/blogs/vlb/weblog/archives/002287.html