This September has pretty much been THAT sort of month for me- and while I was worrying about September, October rolled in! And if you're wondering what "THAT sort of month" means, nearly every word in these first two sentences needed to be corrected BEFORE the proofreading stage of posting this blog.
FRACK!
For those long-suffering, loyal readers who might have been wondering where this blog had gone... rest assured, it is still here. Obviously.
What's been going on in my life?
Well, for starters, I'm still butting heads with R. For those unacquainted, ""R" is a statistical programming language.
EH?
My main Twitter account, @cjoelharrison, deals primarily with data: Big Data, the Internet of Things, Statistics and Mathematics. Now, before you write me off as a propellerhead with no foundation in the real world, let me explain what I do on Twitter.
My main twitter account exists primarily to gather and repeat information and news about Big Data, the Internet of Things and anything related to these topics. Lots of verticals, especially ag, petro, transport and health, and the IoT/IoE applications therein. (And for those who know me IRL... WTF???)
Yes, I actually think about these things.
Anyway, moving right along- I finally installed R and RStudio on our Windows 10 machine... somewhat successfully. R is okay, but the 'swirl' library is not working, so I made a post on the R Studio forum, and hope for a fix.
That's all for now, I suppose.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Showing posts with label Twitter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Twitter. Show all posts
Monday, October 3, 2016
Saturday, February 27, 2016
Feeds, Needs and Speeds
Well, it's starting to get real. The database, that is. As I posted earlier on Twitter, 200 rows of data in a single column do not a RDBMS make, but it's a start (the count is currently 224). As Jackie Gleason quipped in one of his signature lines, "And away we go!"
The casual reader may be wondering at this point: there are actually folks out there still building relational databases? Isn't the non-relational NoSQL model more popular in terms of new deployments, versatility and just plain coolness?
I'd like to explain a bit of my personal journey that brought me to Forty-Two, the database.
Long ago, like teenagers everywhere, I faced highschool graduation without a plan. Not just a clear plan, mind you- NO PLAN. Computer Science was in its infancy at the time, and nearly nonexistent in most high schools. I was not one of the cool kids, nor was I a jock or a brain, but I was also not a nerd. However, I knew one or two nerds. And the nerds were highly focused in their scholarly discipline: they were not into math and science; they were into math. They were geometry slingers, wearing leather slide rule holsters on their hips. They had glasses, thick glasses. Below average complexion. Few social skills. Pocket protectors in their left shirt pockets. And behind the pocket protectors... punch cards for their next "program".They were the late 70's analogues of Drs. Sheldon Cooper and Leonard Hofstadler (The Big Bang Theory).
I was not them. Well, sort of not like them. I liked history. I was (probably) the worst kind of history nerd: I was a military history buff. I started out with Avalon Hill games like France 1940 and Panzer Blitz, and progressed to Tobruk and Squad Leader, eventually culminating in the non-Avalon Hill classic Fletcher Pratt's Naval Wargame. The point is this: as the complexity increased, the playability decreased, as did the number of folks willing to take on the rules. But, I digress.
I was accepted to Rosary College (later Dominican University). I declared history as my major, and spent two unremarkable years there. I eventually had five colleges or universities under my belt, with no undergraduate degree to show for all of the buckazoids invested.
Long before this became a mainstream theory in education, I discovered that we do not all learn in the same way, and that higher education was not really the best choice for me.
Fast forward a few decades. I've mentioned this fairly recently- I was working as a data analyst at an "action sports" company. The company designed paintball equipment, and had it manufactured overseas. My job as the data analyst was to take Wal Mart RetailLink data and dice and slice it into what my employer could use.
The problem was my employer was using either Office 2000 or 2003, which limited Excel to a maximum of ~64K (I believe it was 63,536) rows. As time went on, my data often exceeded this artificial limitation, and I was forced to use Access just to grab the Monday morning data. Once again, skipping several steps, I became adept at moving data between Excel and Access.
Fast forward one more time to today. I use all sorts of tools to do my job; Access and Excel aren't really part of my professional portfolio of commonly used programs on the job, but I use them at home,.. pause for effect.
Yes, although I may have mentioned a bit about Forty-Two before, I don't think I've said too much beyond it was my own little database dev world. Here's where the title comes in: way back when I was an I.T. reseller, we used to often qualify sales by talking about speeds and feeds- equipment specifications. Needs are also important (besides completing the alliterative trilogy).
So, Forty-Two is an obvious reference to Douglas Adams works, and is so named because its' goal is to answer that elusive question: what is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything. It is starting out life as an Access database, currently with only one table. Previous iterations have taught me to take it easy with adding tables, so my aim is to get this Titles table to be mostly complete before adding additional single- or very few-column tables and then finally starting to create the relationships.The first table is called Titles simply because it holds titles: books, videos, software... if its media, then its name goes here. Why? Forced normalization: why go through the normalization process when I can start out with a relatively clean dataset?
This is starting to turn into a wall of words (by my standards, anyway!), so stay tuned... Lego is next!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
The casual reader may be wondering at this point: there are actually folks out there still building relational databases? Isn't the non-relational NoSQL model more popular in terms of new deployments, versatility and just plain coolness?
I'd like to explain a bit of my personal journey that brought me to Forty-Two, the database.
Long ago, like teenagers everywhere, I faced highschool graduation without a plan. Not just a clear plan, mind you- NO PLAN. Computer Science was in its infancy at the time, and nearly nonexistent in most high schools. I was not one of the cool kids, nor was I a jock or a brain, but I was also not a nerd. However, I knew one or two nerds. And the nerds were highly focused in their scholarly discipline: they were not into math and science; they were into math. They were geometry slingers, wearing leather slide rule holsters on their hips. They had glasses, thick glasses. Below average complexion. Few social skills. Pocket protectors in their left shirt pockets. And behind the pocket protectors... punch cards for their next "program".They were the late 70's analogues of Drs. Sheldon Cooper and Leonard Hofstadler (The Big Bang Theory).
I was not them. Well, sort of not like them. I liked history. I was (probably) the worst kind of history nerd: I was a military history buff. I started out with Avalon Hill games like France 1940 and Panzer Blitz, and progressed to Tobruk and Squad Leader, eventually culminating in the non-Avalon Hill classic Fletcher Pratt's Naval Wargame. The point is this: as the complexity increased, the playability decreased, as did the number of folks willing to take on the rules. But, I digress.
I was accepted to Rosary College (later Dominican University). I declared history as my major, and spent two unremarkable years there. I eventually had five colleges or universities under my belt, with no undergraduate degree to show for all of the buckazoids invested.
Long before this became a mainstream theory in education, I discovered that we do not all learn in the same way, and that higher education was not really the best choice for me.
Fast forward a few decades. I've mentioned this fairly recently- I was working as a data analyst at an "action sports" company. The company designed paintball equipment, and had it manufactured overseas. My job as the data analyst was to take Wal Mart RetailLink data and dice and slice it into what my employer could use.
The problem was my employer was using either Office 2000 or 2003, which limited Excel to a maximum of ~64K (I believe it was 63,536) rows. As time went on, my data often exceeded this artificial limitation, and I was forced to use Access just to grab the Monday morning data. Once again, skipping several steps, I became adept at moving data between Excel and Access.
Fast forward one more time to today. I use all sorts of tools to do my job; Access and Excel aren't really part of my professional portfolio of commonly used programs on the job, but I use them at home,.. pause for effect.
Yes, although I may have mentioned a bit about Forty-Two before, I don't think I've said too much beyond it was my own little database dev world. Here's where the title comes in: way back when I was an I.T. reseller, we used to often qualify sales by talking about speeds and feeds- equipment specifications. Needs are also important (besides completing the alliterative trilogy).
So, Forty-Two is an obvious reference to Douglas Adams works, and is so named because its' goal is to answer that elusive question: what is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything. It is starting out life as an Access database, currently with only one table. Previous iterations have taught me to take it easy with adding tables, so my aim is to get this Titles table to be mostly complete before adding additional single- or very few-column tables and then finally starting to create the relationships.The first table is called Titles simply because it holds titles: books, videos, software... if its media, then its name goes here. Why? Forced normalization: why go through the normalization process when I can start out with a relatively clean dataset?
This is starting to turn into a wall of words (by my standards, anyway!), so stay tuned... Lego is next!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Sunday, December 6, 2015
The State of the Blog, v.03
If it's December, then it must be time to...
Celebrate. Commemorate. Conjugate...?
Well, maybe not conjugate, but it's the THIRD anniversary of this blog! I'm somewhat e-excited about this. I can honestly say I never expected it to go this long, or have so many entries. Here's the quick recap, from the 1st blog The Final Frontier to the still strangely most popular one Why, 2K to the one that slipped through the proverbial e-cracks A Red Letter Day In History.
The unifying theme of this blog is data. A casual observer might not notice this, but I did say "unifying theme". So, if you're looking for the golden data nuggets of wisdom check out the twitters or websites of my good e-buddies Kirk Borne Ph.D. Lee Baker Ph.D. or Gregory Piatesky Ph.D.
For those who think my data science is a bit sexist, please check out my good e-buddies Diego Kuonen Ph.D., Carla Gentry and Carol Lynn Curchoe Ph.D.
(In the FWIW column, these folks are some of my followers on Twitter). Not to drop names, of course! :)
In any event, I did drop a few names there, so I should probably clarify things a bit. Some of my more recent posts have been of a somewhat personal nature, and not much data was presented. For the (I'm sure this is a very small percentage of my) readers who were expecting some data in those posts, I apologize.
In actuality, most of my "data" occurs on Twitter, with some on Pinterest. To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure what my most impactful social medium is these days... Twitter is the easiest, Blogspot is the deepest, and Pinterest is the broadest. And, most importantly, it's hobby, so I'm not paying for analytics!
I suppose I enjoy blogging the most, as it is the most creative. Pinterest is lots of fun- and easy. However, there's very little original content. Twitter is fun, but once again, not much original content, as I'm generally more of a repeater rather than an original content contributor. Blogger... this is my "original" e-home. To quote AC/DC- "No stop signs, speed limits...." Not that I'm an AC/DC fan.
An update on the SUL (Secret Underground Lair)....
This is my corner of the SUL. If you're curious, the two leftmost PCs are Win7 machines, and the other is an HP workstation running Ubuntu 12.10, I think. There's actually a 4th screen (which is off camera to the right) for Raspberry Pi use and testing), and there are two additional PCs- one of which is another Win7 box, and the last one is an offline XP machine. In fairly big SUL news, we've been getting rid of old tech boxes (those of the cardboard variety, to clarify), and have reclaimed nearly a square meter of floor space.
That's all for now. Oh... still hoping someone in Antarctica will pick this up!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Sunday, October 25, 2015
So, how was your internet day, dear?
I'm guessing that most readers of this blog spend a fair amount of time connected (at work, on the internet, in the cloud, streaming music, messages, videos, driving a late model car, or interacting in some other way with data or the IoT). Even when I am at work, I am contributing to the data glut as I wait for certain processes to finish doing their... processing.
Creating certain types of files and compiling programs are two time intensive tasks I normally perform. As these tasks are also resource heavy, rather than stare at the progress bars, I turn to my phone and play a round of Bejeweled Blitz or Angry Birds or check my Twitter feed... all of which add to the data glut. Mind you, these activities are innocuous- I'm filling time rather than wasting it staring at progress bars. I'm guessing that the activities I choose to fill the time might be considered a waste of time, but as I have a feel for how long certain process require, Angry Birds & Co. keep me alert and sharp.
The odd thing is that quite often my "decompress" time after work is still internet time. My employer uses a "netnanny" so there are many sites which one simply cannot access at work. This doesn't bother me greatly, as I don't need additional distractions. So, when I get home, I generally logon to two computers- one to play "Rail Nation" and the other for blogging, tweeting and everything else.
In essence, I guess I'm actually decompressing from my work e-framework by logging in to another network or two.
For those who are not constantly connected, this may seem to be quite the conundrum. However, even though I do not consider myself to be in the "continuously connected" category, I thy to keep my social media interactions in the "constantly interacted with" category. And this, I find, is my greatest challenge.
Five years. It's a good measure of time and goals...I think the Soviet Union was famous for these. So, going back 5 years...
The Soviet Union did not exist. I had a Facebook, Google, and Yahoo account. At some point, a Pinterest account was created. Apart from these, I have LinkedIn, Amazon, Newegg and "memberships" on a couple dozen other sites which I infrequently visit.
I'm most active these days on Twitter, then Facebook and finally LinkedIn. Now, this is not to say that I derive social media value from these services in the order in which they are presented; rather, I derive social media value where it exists.
For example, even though the vast majority of my internet social interaction may be generated on Twitter and reposted on Facebook, it does not mean that the main focus of my internet time is on Twitter. Like many folks, I shamelessly self promote- one has to in order to be heard above the static and background noise which is the Internet.
Every so often- generally once every month or so- I post a disclaimer on Twitter indicating that i am NOT a Data Scientist, related data professional , analyst or statistician, because, partly, I have a coworker who initially said, "You're a complete fraud!" To which I replied, "No, I'm completely honest.". He still says it, but mostly in jest these days, mostly because I've shown him comments, retweets and favorites of things I've tweeted or RT'ed. My "thing" is this: although I have no formal background, I have a serious amateur interest in stats, big data, analytics, tech, IoT, and STEM/STEAM, and am a huge proponent of them.
I also love the maker scene. Although I'm not hugely into it right now, our family has three Arduino Uno's, a pair of Raspberry Pi model B's, a couple of Linux (Ubuntu) PCs and lots of Legos, as well as an original Gilbert (pre-Meccano) Erector set, as well as one or two Meccano sets. Don't ask me how many PCs we have- I literally have no idea.
So, to close... I haven't done this in some time, but here are some previous posts you might enjoy. And, in keeping with the spirit of the5 year theme mentioned earlier- here is a selection of 5 older posts, which are currently #6 through #10 in all-time popularity. FWIW, this is post #185... I'm planning something special for #200, which may occur near Christmas (hopefully!)
Creating certain types of files and compiling programs are two time intensive tasks I normally perform. As these tasks are also resource heavy, rather than stare at the progress bars, I turn to my phone and play a round of Bejeweled Blitz or Angry Birds or check my Twitter feed... all of which add to the data glut. Mind you, these activities are innocuous- I'm filling time rather than wasting it staring at progress bars. I'm guessing that the activities I choose to fill the time might be considered a waste of time, but as I have a feel for how long certain process require, Angry Birds & Co. keep me alert and sharp.
The odd thing is that quite often my "decompress" time after work is still internet time. My employer uses a "netnanny" so there are many sites which one simply cannot access at work. This doesn't bother me greatly, as I don't need additional distractions. So, when I get home, I generally logon to two computers- one to play "Rail Nation" and the other for blogging, tweeting and everything else.
In essence, I guess I'm actually decompressing from my work e-framework by logging in to another network or two.
For those who are not constantly connected, this may seem to be quite the conundrum. However, even though I do not consider myself to be in the "continuously connected" category, I thy to keep my social media interactions in the "constantly interacted with" category. And this, I find, is my greatest challenge.
Five years. It's a good measure of time and goals...I think the Soviet Union was famous for these. So, going back 5 years...
The Soviet Union did not exist. I had a Facebook, Google, and Yahoo account. At some point, a Pinterest account was created. Apart from these, I have LinkedIn, Amazon, Newegg and "memberships" on a couple dozen other sites which I infrequently visit.
I'm most active these days on Twitter, then Facebook and finally LinkedIn. Now, this is not to say that I derive social media value from these services in the order in which they are presented; rather, I derive social media value where it exists.
For example, even though the vast majority of my internet social interaction may be generated on Twitter and reposted on Facebook, it does not mean that the main focus of my internet time is on Twitter. Like many folks, I shamelessly self promote- one has to in order to be heard above the static and background noise which is the Internet.
Every so often- generally once every month or so- I post a disclaimer on Twitter indicating that i am NOT a Data Scientist, related data professional , analyst or statistician, because, partly, I have a coworker who initially said, "You're a complete fraud!" To which I replied, "No, I'm completely honest.". He still says it, but mostly in jest these days, mostly because I've shown him comments, retweets and favorites of things I've tweeted or RT'ed. My "thing" is this: although I have no formal background, I have a serious amateur interest in stats, big data, analytics, tech, IoT, and STEM/STEAM, and am a huge proponent of them.
I also love the maker scene. Although I'm not hugely into it right now, our family has three Arduino Uno's, a pair of Raspberry Pi model B's, a couple of Linux (Ubuntu) PCs and lots of Legos, as well as an original Gilbert (pre-Meccano) Erector set, as well as one or two Meccano sets. Don't ask me how many PCs we have- I literally have no idea.
So, to close... I haven't done this in some time, but here are some previous posts you might enjoy. And, in keeping with the spirit of the5 year theme mentioned earlier- here is a selection of 5 older posts, which are currently #6 through #10 in all-time popularity. FWIW, this is post #185... I'm planning something special for #200, which may occur near Christmas (hopefully!)
I hope you are able to enjoy one or more of these. They're far from perfect, but they're honest, and I hope you have at least a bit of fun reading them- I really enjoy writing them!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Monday, June 22, 2015
Data Science, pt 1
I'm calling this "Data Science, pt 1" because it's the beginning, and to be honest, I'm not sure where it end.
To be honest, if you're not interested in Twitter or data, you probably won't be interested in this post. One of my coworkers and I often have discussions about Twitter, partly because I'm a regular poster there and partly because he does not post there. Our inside joke about Twitter, though, is about my posting.
If you follow my twitter posts (hochspeyer@CJoelHarrison), you'll see an account that is focused primarily on Big Data, IoT and programming. We have some good-natured interplay about this-
"You're a fraud," he says.
"I tell the truth," I reply.
This can, and sometimes does- go on all night. I'm not mentioning his name because of my personal blogging rules: if I don't have permission, then I don't have permission.
In the end, we agree to disagree. So, why the Big Preface?
Well, mostly because this blog is about data. And, although data seems to be the furthest thing from a theme, I try to keep data as the unifying theme.
Believe it or not, Twitter is a two-way street. As with all other social media, marketing is important. In the world of social media, I have this blog. I have a Facebook account with many friends. I have a LinkedIn account with many connections. I have Google+ and a Pinterest account. I used to be active on a few forums. I even had a mySpace account. Of all of these, I regard Twitter as my primary and most premium e-presence.
Why? Chicago's own Ides of March really expressed it well: it's my vehicle. More precisely, it's my e-vehicle: it puts my name where I want it to be on the internet. I don't remember exactly how the old truism about publicity went, but it was something like this: "Any publicity is better than no publicity." This is largely (but not entirely) true for someone who is trying to find a job or build a reputation on the internet: almost 100% of the time, any internet presence is better than none. If you're looking for job, you should have an established social media presence, and probably on at least LinkedIn and Twitter- and it had better damn well be squeaky clean. Please make no mistake: I very seldom (that is, exceedingly rarely) use a word such as "damn" online- and this is HIGHLY intentional. Any reputable firm will probably be have at least a concern about online vulgarity or profanity.
But I digress... back to me and Twitter. I have more than one Twitter account- I don't think this is unusual: one is fairly general, and the other is pretty tightly subject focused. I really don't do too much on my "general" account, and I have no special reason for the lack of activity there. My primary account, though, currently has a few hundred followers, and I follow a few more. What's interesting about this account, though, is my relative level of education to that of my followers. Here's where the ride gets interesting, so buckle up, kiddos!
The subject matter that I generally tweet about is Big Data, Internet of Things, Programming and, to a lesser extent, Technology (Computer, Electronic and Otherwise). I researched this a bit- probably at least thirty minutes on Google (this is the equivalent of 1.21 eternities in Internet time) and could not come up with a definitive answer. However, I know that I have no fewer than five PhD's and one PhD candidate in a population of ~225 followers, which means that ~2% of my FOLLOWERS have doctoral degrees. As best as I could tell through my "extensive" research, approximately 1% of ALL college students in the United States of America complete a doctorate. So as far as my followers are concerned, I think I'm pretty top-heavy in the academic department, even though I'm a card-carrying member of the unwashed masses that check the "some college completed" box.
In fact, in some circles I may even be classified as a "savant".
In any event, I'm going to leave "this" alone for now. When (and/or if) I gain further insights, I will continue this train of thought.
Until then, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
To be honest, if you're not interested in Twitter or data, you probably won't be interested in this post. One of my coworkers and I often have discussions about Twitter, partly because I'm a regular poster there and partly because he does not post there. Our inside joke about Twitter, though, is about my posting.
If you follow my twitter posts (hochspeyer@CJoelHarrison), you'll see an account that is focused primarily on Big Data, IoT and programming. We have some good-natured interplay about this-
"You're a fraud," he says.
"I tell the truth," I reply.
This can, and sometimes does- go on all night. I'm not mentioning his name because of my personal blogging rules: if I don't have permission, then I don't have permission.
In the end, we agree to disagree. So, why the Big Preface?
Well, mostly because this blog is about data. And, although data seems to be the furthest thing from a theme, I try to keep data as the unifying theme.
Believe it or not, Twitter is a two-way street. As with all other social media, marketing is important. In the world of social media, I have this blog. I have a Facebook account with many friends. I have a LinkedIn account with many connections. I have Google+ and a Pinterest account. I used to be active on a few forums. I even had a mySpace account. Of all of these, I regard Twitter as my primary and most premium e-presence.
Why? Chicago's own Ides of March really expressed it well: it's my vehicle. More precisely, it's my e-vehicle: it puts my name where I want it to be on the internet. I don't remember exactly how the old truism about publicity went, but it was something like this: "Any publicity is better than no publicity." This is largely (but not entirely) true for someone who is trying to find a job or build a reputation on the internet: almost 100% of the time, any internet presence is better than none. If you're looking for job, you should have an established social media presence, and probably on at least LinkedIn and Twitter- and it had better damn well be squeaky clean. Please make no mistake: I very seldom (that is, exceedingly rarely) use a word such as "damn" online- and this is HIGHLY intentional. Any reputable firm will probably be have at least a concern about online vulgarity or profanity.
But I digress... back to me and Twitter. I have more than one Twitter account- I don't think this is unusual: one is fairly general, and the other is pretty tightly subject focused. I really don't do too much on my "general" account, and I have no special reason for the lack of activity there. My primary account, though, currently has a few hundred followers, and I follow a few more. What's interesting about this account, though, is my relative level of education to that of my followers. Here's where the ride gets interesting, so buckle up, kiddos!
The subject matter that I generally tweet about is Big Data, Internet of Things, Programming and, to a lesser extent, Technology (Computer, Electronic and Otherwise). I researched this a bit- probably at least thirty minutes on Google (this is the equivalent of 1.21 eternities in Internet time) and could not come up with a definitive answer. However, I know that I have no fewer than five PhD's and one PhD candidate in a population of ~225 followers, which means that ~2% of my FOLLOWERS have doctoral degrees. As best as I could tell through my "extensive" research, approximately 1% of ALL college students in the United States of America complete a doctorate. So as far as my followers are concerned, I think I'm pretty top-heavy in the academic department, even though I'm a card-carrying member of the unwashed masses that check the "some college completed" box.
In fact, in some circles I may even be classified as a "savant".
In any event, I'm going to leave "this" alone for now. When (and/or if) I gain further insights, I will continue this train of thought.
Until then, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Saturday, June 20, 2015
Joe Cool, etc.
One of the things that is really pretty nifty about blogging (and yes, I do talk this way in real life) is that it is creative writing which does not need to be tied to a plot. I think I've had the desire to write a book since around my high school years, and have yet to do it. I'm sometimes a little jealous of some folks who are actually published, like my good e-buddy J. S. Frankel. He's written a few books and if you follow the link you'll get to see his Young Adult offerings on Amazon. The extent of my creative writing (apart from things required in school) was some reporting I did for my college newspaper, The Reporter ( I kid you NOT!), Twitter (known in some circles as "microblogging"), this blog, and an infrequently updated blog on Wordpress. Oh, and a slew of incomplete and unpublished science fiction and/or fantasy stories, as well as one incomplete collaboration from college with my good friend Mark. We were once best friends, but once he became engaged, he felt it was his duty to inform me that I was being demoted in favor of his soon-to-be-bride. Not to be outdone, Jennifer appeared in my life not long after that, and we were married in the same year that Mark and Mary were.
Although I've only used "Potpourri" as part of a blog title twice, and even though that is an apt description of this blog, I've decided to reserve the use of that word for another blog. "Joe Cool" was/is an alter ego of Snoopy, along with the famous World War One fighter ace. I think I grew up during the heyday of the Peanuts comic strip- Peanuts seemed to be all over pop culture, and the Peanuts holiday cartoons on television were a must-see, even if it was the third or fourth or more time of watching them. They were special, and they were really family time.
This blog, though, borrows thematically from- of all things- a tee shirt I bought in the 80's.
For a brief period in the 80's, I worked at J.C. Penney's in the Brickyard, the first "real" shopping center in Chicago. I actually ended up working at a few stores in the Brickyard, but I worked at Penney's before the mall actually opened. At some point, Penney's carried a line of Peanuts-themed shirts. I purchased several (with an employee discount) and one of them had a picture of Snoopy (in his Joe Cool persona). The graphic featured Joe Cool in his signature dark sunglasses flipping a flying disk (a.k.a. "Frisbee") with the following text:
"What else is there to do on a Saturday afternoon when there's nothing on TV, your clothes are in the laundry and your girlfriend has left you?"
That's pretty close to a quote, in any event. I tried Googling it and came up with nothing.
Finally, in the world of news, I'd like to introduce someone new to my blog- my sister-in-law Donna. In true Love American Style fashion, we've known "of" each other for nearly thirty years, but have only really connected in the past year. She's a good egg- anyone who enjoys my particular brand of humor deserves a pat on the back. And a job- she got caught in the recent bout of Schlumberger layoffs. So if you're in Houston (or maybe Dallas) and reading this- she's lookin'.
Someone recently asked me (okay, it was Donna, who is new to blogging) how I find all of these readers in countries outside of the United States? The answers is: I don't know. I was checking my view stats just before getting back to the blog, and discovered twenty-five new page views from Portugal.
Go figure.
I need to close this out, but one or two more topics are left. First, as I am a proud member of that special group of I.T. workers known to the world only as Nightstalkers, I have to update our grass. At home, that is... the lawn. We seem to have had a good deal of rain during May and June it seems, and as I enjoy cutting the grass (probably an Air Force flashback, but more than likely because it was one of my chores as a youngster), I generally get to do the mowing. And, I'm quicker than Jennifer. So, I happily cut the grass. The problem, though, is that I'm a Nightstalker, and as such, my grasscutting hours are sometimes a bit constrained. For example, we are allowed to "start our engines" after 0700, and are requested to cease power equipment operation by 1900 by our local municipality. The Chicago area is known to be rather humid, so the grass is often dewy in the morning... difficult to cut. My "morning" during the workweek is 1900, so my best opportunities for lawn maintenance are the weekend and Monday. Although there's been no rain for a few days, I ended up cutting the grass in two stages- Thursday before work, and this morning (Saturday) after work. Our compost bin is nearly overflowing from the clippings, and the lawn was still quite wet, so I think more grass clippings got left on the lawn than those which made it to the compost.
I'm not sure how much can bee seen from these pictures, but the grass in many areas was close to 4" (10cm) tall. It was so tall that I'd started to get calls from conservation agencies around the world asking me to kindly return their endangered species.
Well, not quite, but it was certainly buggier the closer I got to the lushest, least-trafficked area behind the garage.
Also, not sure about the rest of the world, but here in the United States, tomorrow (Sunday) is Father's Day. Happy Father's Day to all of the Dads out there.
No data to report this week, but I have a programming update.
My employer uses a very interesting software package for programming our products. As you may know, we produce what is known in the United States as "direct mail"; that is, advertising pieces that are sent through the postal service to named recipients. The client gives us their designs, tells us what specific information that a particular addressee should receive, and we- through composition, layout and programming- will produce a mailpiece that is tailored to each recipient's anticipated needs. On Thursday night, I had to do a bit of break/fox on one of these programs, and then on Friday I was able to pass this newfound knowledge to a few colleagues.
One other bit of very informal data- actually closer to conjecture: I may quite possibly have the highest percentage of folks with PH.D.'s that follow a non-degreed poster than any other non-degreed poster on Twitter... maybe just a hunch... maybe!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Although I've only used "Potpourri" as part of a blog title twice, and even though that is an apt description of this blog, I've decided to reserve the use of that word for another blog. "Joe Cool" was/is an alter ego of Snoopy, along with the famous World War One fighter ace. I think I grew up during the heyday of the Peanuts comic strip- Peanuts seemed to be all over pop culture, and the Peanuts holiday cartoons on television were a must-see, even if it was the third or fourth or more time of watching them. They were special, and they were really family time.
This blog, though, borrows thematically from- of all things- a tee shirt I bought in the 80's.
For a brief period in the 80's, I worked at J.C. Penney's in the Brickyard, the first "real" shopping center in Chicago. I actually ended up working at a few stores in the Brickyard, but I worked at Penney's before the mall actually opened. At some point, Penney's carried a line of Peanuts-themed shirts. I purchased several (with an employee discount) and one of them had a picture of Snoopy (in his Joe Cool persona). The graphic featured Joe Cool in his signature dark sunglasses flipping a flying disk (a.k.a. "Frisbee") with the following text:
"What else is there to do on a Saturday afternoon when there's nothing on TV, your clothes are in the laundry and your girlfriend has left you?"
That's pretty close to a quote, in any event. I tried Googling it and came up with nothing.
Finally, in the world of news, I'd like to introduce someone new to my blog- my sister-in-law Donna. In true Love American Style fashion, we've known "of" each other for nearly thirty years, but have only really connected in the past year. She's a good egg- anyone who enjoys my particular brand of humor deserves a pat on the back. And a job- she got caught in the recent bout of Schlumberger layoffs. So if you're in Houston (or maybe Dallas) and reading this- she's lookin'.
Someone recently asked me (okay, it was Donna, who is new to blogging) how I find all of these readers in countries outside of the United States? The answers is: I don't know. I was checking my view stats just before getting back to the blog, and discovered twenty-five new page views from Portugal.
Go figure.
I need to close this out, but one or two more topics are left. First, as I am a proud member of that special group of I.T. workers known to the world only as Nightstalkers, I have to update our grass. At home, that is... the lawn. We seem to have had a good deal of rain during May and June it seems, and as I enjoy cutting the grass (probably an Air Force flashback, but more than likely because it was one of my chores as a youngster), I generally get to do the mowing. And, I'm quicker than Jennifer. So, I happily cut the grass. The problem, though, is that I'm a Nightstalker, and as such, my grasscutting hours are sometimes a bit constrained. For example, we are allowed to "start our engines" after 0700, and are requested to cease power equipment operation by 1900 by our local municipality. The Chicago area is known to be rather humid, so the grass is often dewy in the morning... difficult to cut. My "morning" during the workweek is 1900, so my best opportunities for lawn maintenance are the weekend and Monday. Although there's been no rain for a few days, I ended up cutting the grass in two stages- Thursday before work, and this morning (Saturday) after work. Our compost bin is nearly overflowing from the clippings, and the lawn was still quite wet, so I think more grass clippings got left on the lawn than those which made it to the compost.
 |
| At the start |
 | ||||||
| Compost overflowing |
Well, not quite, but it was certainly buggier the closer I got to the lushest, least-trafficked area behind the garage.
Also, not sure about the rest of the world, but here in the United States, tomorrow (Sunday) is Father's Day. Happy Father's Day to all of the Dads out there.
No data to report this week, but I have a programming update.
My employer uses a very interesting software package for programming our products. As you may know, we produce what is known in the United States as "direct mail"; that is, advertising pieces that are sent through the postal service to named recipients. The client gives us their designs, tells us what specific information that a particular addressee should receive, and we- through composition, layout and programming- will produce a mailpiece that is tailored to each recipient's anticipated needs. On Thursday night, I had to do a bit of break/fox on one of these programs, and then on Friday I was able to pass this newfound knowledge to a few colleagues.
One other bit of very informal data- actually closer to conjecture: I may quite possibly have the highest percentage of folks with PH.D.'s that follow a non-degreed poster than any other non-degreed poster on Twitter... maybe just a hunch... maybe!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Thursday, June 4, 2015
(Around) 2.5 years, or, my personal Interwebz v2.1
Around two and a half years ago, I posted my first blog- December 4th, 2012 (it's a pretty short post- even by my current blogging standards!). Even way back then (figuratively speaking) I strove to keep data in the mix as the unifying theme of this blog. And at the end of May, 2015, I'm still blogging about life in general with data as the underlying theme.
It's June of 2015 now, and I've been working on my Twitter account. I consider Twitter serious work primarily because it is an integral element of my online presence strategy- and two and a half years ago, I didn't even know what an online presence strategy was, let alone seeing the need for one. After all, Twitter is one of the places where this blogs posts, but more importantly, it's where I interact with the world of #bigdata and #IoT.
I'm a firm believer in cross-pollenization and shameless self-promotion when it comes to creating a larger presence on the internet, so here's an invitation: if you have an understanding of any of the following terms, have a personal or professional interest in them, or possibly have heard one or more of them before and would like to learn more about them... here's a sample of the topics I address on my (hochspeyer) account on twitter:
#bigdata, #notsobigdata, #smalldata, #microdata, #database, #analytics, #stats, #IoT (Internet of Things), #IoE (Internet of Everything), #M2M (machine to machine), #machinelearning and, of course, #hadoop and #python. I touch on a lot of related topics on that account, but if Big Data and the Internet of Things are topics which you are interested in, you may enjoy following.
My other twitter account (hochspeyer1) still has a tech focus, but has more of a personal touch, looking more at #maker and #programming topics, as well as life in general.
Whew!
The state of the state of my microdata projects: as of today (Jun 4, 2015), the SUL (Secret Underground Lair) is still theoretically experiencing remodeling; by this I mean that while all of the furniture and shelving are in their (probable) final positions, everything that came out and came from upstairs still is in need of homes. Forty-two. my database project, is currently on hold. The Lego database (currently an Excel 2007 workbook) is currently in a data entry phase, and will eventually be a part of Forty-two. Even the Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Python projects are all on hold pending the completion of the SUL upgrade/remodel. Lastly, I'm building my media library, one song at a time. I'm using Windows Media Player, which I suppose is extremely lazy, but the interface is familiar and it does pretty much all that I want, so for now it suffices.
That's all from the SUL for now. As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
It's June of 2015 now, and I've been working on my Twitter account. I consider Twitter serious work primarily because it is an integral element of my online presence strategy- and two and a half years ago, I didn't even know what an online presence strategy was, let alone seeing the need for one. After all, Twitter is one of the places where this blogs posts, but more importantly, it's where I interact with the world of #bigdata and #IoT.
I'm a firm believer in cross-pollenization and shameless self-promotion when it comes to creating a larger presence on the internet, so here's an invitation: if you have an understanding of any of the following terms, have a personal or professional interest in them, or possibly have heard one or more of them before and would like to learn more about them... here's a sample of the topics I address on my (hochspeyer) account on twitter:
#bigdata, #notsobigdata, #smalldata, #microdata, #database, #analytics, #stats, #IoT (Internet of Things), #IoE (Internet of Everything), #M2M (machine to machine), #machinelearning and, of course, #hadoop and #python. I touch on a lot of related topics on that account, but if Big Data and the Internet of Things are topics which you are interested in, you may enjoy following.
My other twitter account (hochspeyer1) still has a tech focus, but has more of a personal touch, looking more at #maker and #programming topics, as well as life in general.
Whew!
The state of the state of my microdata projects: as of today (Jun 4, 2015), the SUL (Secret Underground Lair) is still theoretically experiencing remodeling; by this I mean that while all of the furniture and shelving are in their (probable) final positions, everything that came out and came from upstairs still is in need of homes. Forty-two. my database project, is currently on hold. The Lego database (currently an Excel 2007 workbook) is currently in a data entry phase, and will eventually be a part of Forty-two. Even the Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Python projects are all on hold pending the completion of the SUL upgrade/remodel. Lastly, I'm building my media library, one song at a time. I'm using Windows Media Player, which I suppose is extremely lazy, but the interface is familiar and it does pretty much all that I want, so for now it suffices.
That's all from the SUL for now. As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Data, defined
Although it is not my intent, I am certain that this post has the potential to step on a few toes, possibly bruise an ego or two, or ruffle some feathers. I may even get someone mad. Really e-mad.
For starters, I do not have any letters, diplomas, certifications and am not currently professionally employed in whatever one might consider the "data community". Whatever that might be. I do not claim to be an expert or have any special expertise or training in the areas of Big Data, the Internet of Things/Everything, Statistics, Analytics or The Cloud. I was once employed as a data analyst working with Small Data for a short time.
Whew!
So, who and what exactly am I?
I'm a guy who tweets (and retweets) primarily on the subjects of Big Data, IoT, programming and related topics. As far back as high school- maybe even earlier- I've been interested in data. It was either my music collection or Fletcher Pratt's Naval Wargame that gave me my start in classifying and quantifying. I remember even attempting to do a few music surveys way back when, and some of the respondents were unhappy because the polls were not simple popularity contests, but the answers were weighted based upon their position on the poll. Fast forward to today. I'm currently building a flat database of my Lego collection in Excel 2007 (why 2007? Because that's what I have on the computer nearest to the Legos!). This, in turn, will be added to my master database Forty-Two- so named because it answers the question of Life, the Universe and Everything.
Having said ALL of that, I'd like to start off by saying that the term "data" may not be as concrete as we are lead to believe. In my world, data comes in the following flavors: Big Data, Not-So-Big Data, Small Data, Micro Data, and Statistics. Depending upon the size of the dataset(s) and one's perspective, most- if not all- data can fit into more than one classification. Really? Sure. Case: say there's a hypothetical high school senior who is one of the stars of his basketball team. He's a good defender, doesn't get a great deal of fouls (below the league average), and is about average in scoring- except he leads the league in free throw percentage. Several colleges and universities are interested in him- they've got data on this fellow going back to 6th grade. That's data- to them. To me, a person who could care less about basketball- it's nothing more than a bunch of irrelevant stats. On the other hand, these same scouts would not be impressed by the number of PhD's that follow me on Twitter.
So, how big is a Big Data dataset? I asked a coworker. He wasn't sure, but thought a mail list might qualify. Don't laugh too soon- some of the mail lists I've seen have more than 10 million names. To me, though, I'd put that in the Not-So-Big Data or Small Data categories. The IoT, Amazon, Google, Youtube and Wikipedia definitely fit into the Big Data category, but to the average person, these can be tough to visualize. So, for what I think might be a decent, understandable Big Data dataset, I propose the 2010 U.S. Census. It was a 10 item questionnaire (with a few extra answers possible) that mailed to 135,000,000 addresses representing approximately 309,000,000 persons.
Small Data could be a database, a website or the phone directory of a small to medium sized city- the lines are pretty fuzzy here.
Lastly, there's microdata. I'm not sure if this term is used anywhere else, but I find it to be a convenient term for personal data- data generated and maintained by one person or one family for their own use and not often formally shared. A cataloged collection of coins, stamps, recipes, exercise/workout logs or Legos- all of these are Microdata in my worldview.
Thanks for your patience- I hope you enjoyed this. I generally write a lot less... I'm not a fan of writing or reading walls of words!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
For starters, I do not have any letters, diplomas, certifications and am not currently professionally employed in whatever one might consider the "data community". Whatever that might be. I do not claim to be an expert or have any special expertise or training in the areas of Big Data, the Internet of Things/Everything, Statistics, Analytics or The Cloud. I was once employed as a data analyst working with Small Data for a short time.
Whew!
So, who and what exactly am I?
I'm a guy who tweets (and retweets) primarily on the subjects of Big Data, IoT, programming and related topics. As far back as high school- maybe even earlier- I've been interested in data. It was either my music collection or Fletcher Pratt's Naval Wargame that gave me my start in classifying and quantifying. I remember even attempting to do a few music surveys way back when, and some of the respondents were unhappy because the polls were not simple popularity contests, but the answers were weighted based upon their position on the poll. Fast forward to today. I'm currently building a flat database of my Lego collection in Excel 2007 (why 2007? Because that's what I have on the computer nearest to the Legos!). This, in turn, will be added to my master database Forty-Two- so named because it answers the question of Life, the Universe and Everything.
Having said ALL of that, I'd like to start off by saying that the term "data" may not be as concrete as we are lead to believe. In my world, data comes in the following flavors: Big Data, Not-So-Big Data, Small Data, Micro Data, and Statistics. Depending upon the size of the dataset(s) and one's perspective, most- if not all- data can fit into more than one classification. Really? Sure. Case: say there's a hypothetical high school senior who is one of the stars of his basketball team. He's a good defender, doesn't get a great deal of fouls (below the league average), and is about average in scoring- except he leads the league in free throw percentage. Several colleges and universities are interested in him- they've got data on this fellow going back to 6th grade. That's data- to them. To me, a person who could care less about basketball- it's nothing more than a bunch of irrelevant stats. On the other hand, these same scouts would not be impressed by the number of PhD's that follow me on Twitter.
So, how big is a Big Data dataset? I asked a coworker. He wasn't sure, but thought a mail list might qualify. Don't laugh too soon- some of the mail lists I've seen have more than 10 million names. To me, though, I'd put that in the Not-So-Big Data or Small Data categories. The IoT, Amazon, Google, Youtube and Wikipedia definitely fit into the Big Data category, but to the average person, these can be tough to visualize. So, for what I think might be a decent, understandable Big Data dataset, I propose the 2010 U.S. Census. It was a 10 item questionnaire (with a few extra answers possible) that mailed to 135,000,000 addresses representing approximately 309,000,000 persons.
Small Data could be a database, a website or the phone directory of a small to medium sized city- the lines are pretty fuzzy here.
Lastly, there's microdata. I'm not sure if this term is used anywhere else, but I find it to be a convenient term for personal data- data generated and maintained by one person or one family for their own use and not often formally shared. A cataloged collection of coins, stamps, recipes, exercise/workout logs or Legos- all of these are Microdata in my worldview.
Thanks for your patience- I hope you enjoyed this. I generally write a lot less... I'm not a fan of writing or reading walls of words!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Saturday, May 9, 2015
Life in the Twittersphere
I'm not going to do the parody lyrics here, but bring up the Eagles' "Life In The Fast Lane" from their "Hotel California" album and you can sort of hum along- it pretty much works. I used to do a lot of parody lyrics, as a matter of fact, but as far as this blog goes, I really didn't make the connection with the Eagles until I actually saw the title of the blog.
For what its worth, this was going to be another "Hoodie Migration" blog, but that was before I read a few posts from the Outmannedmommy blog. To be fair, the Outmannedmommy blog is quite funny, but it may be NSFW (not safe for work) as F-bombs occasionally detonate- especially from guest writers! Still, I enjoy Mary Widdicks' writing- because her style is great, and I can relate to her writing.
Also, strangely (or not?), I don't read a lot of other blogs, Mary's is the only funny one I normally read; most of the rest are retweets on Twitter (nothing wrong with that) about the IoT and bigdata.
And here's the crux, the nexus of this post: Me and Twitter (if you ant to try your hand at parodying this, try Tom T. Hall's most excellent "Me and Jesus" or "Faster Horses, Younger Women, Older Whiskey and More Money".
Twitter is by far the number one reason for my dearth of blogs as of late. I've been contributing a fair amount to the Twittersphere, focusing primarily on Big Data and the Internet of Things. One of my coworkers constantly tells me that I'm a fraud (he's kidding... mostly) because I'm not a PhD, a data scientist, a statistician, or any number of other things associated with Big Data and the IoT... and at that point I always remind him that I make no claims to be anything more than a catalyst or a conduit for ideas. And even though I'm no expert, I've become fairly adept at picking interesting and informative stories, factoids, infographs and blogs. This is evidenced by several folks that ARE PhD's, data scientists and statisticians who follow (and retweet) me.
That's the really short version of Life in the Twittersphere, but I need to get to bed, so I am going to close this and hopefully get another blog out very soon.
News from the Secret Underground Lair (SUL): I think I had mentioned that Mr. T and I were planning a bit of remodeling in the SUL. I'm happy to report that the majority of that work is now complete. Well, the furniture moving is done. Everything that got moved out now needs to be moved back in- I wish there was a defrag utility for small offices... press a button on the wall, and all of the books, boxes, doodads, computer components, computers, etc would find the optimal place to rest and automatically go there.
Finally, data news (this blog is about data, right?) I've got a spreadsheet roughed out, and have put a bit of test data in. So far, everything looks good: according to my flat database, I have 71 Lego elements.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
For what its worth, this was going to be another "Hoodie Migration" blog, but that was before I read a few posts from the Outmannedmommy blog. To be fair, the Outmannedmommy blog is quite funny, but it may be NSFW (not safe for work) as F-bombs occasionally detonate- especially from guest writers! Still, I enjoy Mary Widdicks' writing- because her style is great, and I can relate to her writing.
Also, strangely (or not?), I don't read a lot of other blogs, Mary's is the only funny one I normally read; most of the rest are retweets on Twitter (nothing wrong with that) about the IoT and bigdata.
And here's the crux, the nexus of this post: Me and Twitter (if you ant to try your hand at parodying this, try Tom T. Hall's most excellent "Me and Jesus" or "Faster Horses, Younger Women, Older Whiskey and More Money".
Twitter is by far the number one reason for my dearth of blogs as of late. I've been contributing a fair amount to the Twittersphere, focusing primarily on Big Data and the Internet of Things. One of my coworkers constantly tells me that I'm a fraud (he's kidding... mostly) because I'm not a PhD, a data scientist, a statistician, or any number of other things associated with Big Data and the IoT... and at that point I always remind him that I make no claims to be anything more than a catalyst or a conduit for ideas. And even though I'm no expert, I've become fairly adept at picking interesting and informative stories, factoids, infographs and blogs. This is evidenced by several folks that ARE PhD's, data scientists and statisticians who follow (and retweet) me.
That's the really short version of Life in the Twittersphere, but I need to get to bed, so I am going to close this and hopefully get another blog out very soon.
News from the Secret Underground Lair (SUL): I think I had mentioned that Mr. T and I were planning a bit of remodeling in the SUL. I'm happy to report that the majority of that work is now complete. Well, the furniture moving is done. Everything that got moved out now needs to be moved back in- I wish there was a defrag utility for small offices... press a button on the wall, and all of the books, boxes, doodads, computer components, computers, etc would find the optimal place to rest and automatically go there.
Finally, data news (this blog is about data, right?) I've got a spreadsheet roughed out, and have put a bit of test data in. So far, everything looks good: according to my flat database, I have 71 Lego elements.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Forty-Two, v7 (or so)
I've been spending a fair amount of time on Twitter (@CjoelHarrison) lately... so much, in fact, that other elements of my e-life have been suffering. Case in point: this blog. In January of 2015, while I was establishing my presence in the twittersphere, I did not post a single blog. Possibly even more tragic, my playing time on Rail Nation has suffered tremendously. And don't even get me started on my lack of quality Steam time... I'm not certain when the last time I played Sid Meier's Civilization V was.
In any event, here I am once more heralding the latest iteration of my pet database project, Forty-Two. This may indeed be Version Seven; then again, I've not kept track, so it could be any number greater than three. This iteration, though, is different from previous ones: it was not necessitated by a hardware crash or a software glitch. Rather, it is simply a fresh start with a few ideas to make a (relatively) large dataset more organized.
So, I suppose the logical question would be this: why would a home user with no database training want to even try to build an Access database in the first place?
I suppose I could just write it off as an Aspie thing- a project that goes on forever without a realistic chance of being completed (I'm not sure that's exactly an Aspie trait!) It could be that I haven't learned MySQL yet, or haven't even tried NoSQL, and let's not even bring Hadoop into the discussion!
The reality is a lot more pedestrian. And practical: I want to know what I don't know.
In plainer speech, I want to learn how to build a small relational database from the ground up. I want this database to be useful to my family. And, possibly the most important reason for building the database: should anything bad happen, I'd like to have it as a record for an insurance claim.
So there, that's what drives me to keep on trying to build Forty-Two, the database that answers the question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
The other side projects that have been taking up my time are coding. Professionally, I'm a programmer. The interesting thing about that is that even if I spent the majority of my time programming, the world would probably not recognize me as a programmer, because the tools that I use are very specialized and are more related to composition and layout than programming- and when we DO actually write some code, there is absolutely no way it con be confused with a Turing complete language. Still, some of these tools DO have actual programming, and to help myself to better understand these areas, I've taken to studying the Python language.
Gasp- it's official now: yours truly is studying Python.
print("That's all for now folks!")
In any event, here I am once more heralding the latest iteration of my pet database project, Forty-Two. This may indeed be Version Seven; then again, I've not kept track, so it could be any number greater than three. This iteration, though, is different from previous ones: it was not necessitated by a hardware crash or a software glitch. Rather, it is simply a fresh start with a few ideas to make a (relatively) large dataset more organized.
So, I suppose the logical question would be this: why would a home user with no database training want to even try to build an Access database in the first place?
I suppose I could just write it off as an Aspie thing- a project that goes on forever without a realistic chance of being completed (I'm not sure that's exactly an Aspie trait!) It could be that I haven't learned MySQL yet, or haven't even tried NoSQL, and let's not even bring Hadoop into the discussion!
The reality is a lot more pedestrian. And practical: I want to know what I don't know.
In plainer speech, I want to learn how to build a small relational database from the ground up. I want this database to be useful to my family. And, possibly the most important reason for building the database: should anything bad happen, I'd like to have it as a record for an insurance claim.
So there, that's what drives me to keep on trying to build Forty-Two, the database that answers the question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
The other side projects that have been taking up my time are coding. Professionally, I'm a programmer. The interesting thing about that is that even if I spent the majority of my time programming, the world would probably not recognize me as a programmer, because the tools that I use are very specialized and are more related to composition and layout than programming- and when we DO actually write some code, there is absolutely no way it con be confused with a Turing complete language. Still, some of these tools DO have actual programming, and to help myself to better understand these areas, I've taken to studying the Python language.
Gasp- it's official now: yours truly is studying Python.
print("That's all for now folks!")
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)