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New xcowsay release 1.6

January 22nd, 2022

A new year, a new version of Xcowsay! Just a few minor changes this time:

  • Fix portability issues with signed vs unsigned chars in the config file parser (thanks to Charlène Wendling).
  • The -t option now allows fractional time values (e.g. -t 0.5 to display for half a second).
  • Set window type hint to notification to avoid shadows and other decorations (thanks to Markus Demleitner).
  • Add support for right-to-left text (thanks to @ilevi-code).

Download: xcowsay-1.6.tar.gz

This release is signed with my PGP key ID 74319F1A: xcowsay-1.6.tar.gz.sig

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Evergrande Spring

December 20th, 2021

Perhaps the last chance to sample Evergrande Spring, the mineral water from Evergrande, better known as world’s most indebted property developer. This is the low sodium version, it tasted like normal water.

Diversification is important in business

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Zhaojialou Ancient Town

December 15th, 2021

Here’s another one of those “ancient” towns in the suburbs of Shanghai. This one is called Zhaojialou in the south-west Pujiang area. It’s a bit so-so. Usually these towns are significantly better if they have some attraction you can visit like and temple or a garden, but this one is just some old houses and shops.

I walked there from the end of line 15 and across the river on a ferry. The best bit was the industrial area under the bridge where the ferry runs.

Zhaojialou

On the other size is Pujiang country park which is quite pleasant for a walk too.

Nanxiang Ancient Town

December 2nd, 2021

Last week I went for a walk around Nanxiang another one of these “ancient” water towns. It’s not really a separate town, just a few old streets in Shanghai’s Jiading suburb. You can reach there easily on line 11.

The best part is definitely Guyi garden which is the classical-style garden pictured above. I went on a weekday and it was pretty quiet. There’s also an extensive Buddhist temple which is free to get in. Definitely recommend this one over Qibao, but there’s much nicer old towns if you go to Suzhou or somewhere a bit further away from the city.

New NVC version 1.5.3

November 13th, 2021

I’ve released a new version 1.5.3 of NVC, the VHDL compiler I’m working on. This is hopefully the final bug fix release on the 1.5 branch containing the following changes back-ported from the development branch:

  • Handle access(2) returning EPERM in macOS sandbox.
  • Fix race when multiple processes concurrently update a library.
  • Fix --syntax command when file contains multiple design units.
  • Allow constant folding of nand/nor/xor/xnor.
  • Fix potential out of memory condition when evaluating complex assert expressions.
  • Fix incorrect result of mod operator with negative operands.
  • Fixed intermittent crash when evaluating nested constant records.
  • Buffer too small for printing TIME’HIGH.

nvc-1.5.3.tar.gz
nvc-1.5.3.tar.gz.sig

This release is signed with GPG key fingerprint 0784 505A DB5D 7D86 D2BD E6DA BCDB 295F 7431 9F1A. Download both the .sig and .tar.gz files and verify with:

gpg --keyserver pgp.mit.edu --recv-keys BCDB295F74319F1A
gpg --verify nvc-1.5.3.tar.gz

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How I Accidentally Discovered Gnome’s Emoji Keyboard

October 31st, 2021

After I updated Gnome recently I was alarmed to discover my usual C-. key binding in Emacs was broken and also now stealing the keyboard input. Turns out it’s Gnome/Ibus’s emoji input method which was previously bound by default to C-Shift-e and I was completely unaware of. It’s quite fun! (You can change the shortcut key to whatever you want in ibus-setup.)

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Shengsi Island

October 3rd, 2021

Got out of Shanghai for the first time in 2021 last weekend. Not far though, just to a little island off the coast. You can get there quite conveniently with a combined coach and ferry ticket from Nanpu Bridge tourist coach centre. The ferry actually leaves from another island, Yangshan island, which is home to a huge container port and connected to the mainland by a long sea bridge.

There’s enough small attractions to spend a weekend, including beaches, temples, and a lot of cliffs, which you can see pictures of below. I liked the relaxed style of the little fishing villages.

Carol Vorderman’s Best Selling Compiler Textbook

September 19th, 2021

Now I’ve heard Amazon has being going downhill recently but…

I love how Carol Vorderman hasn’t aged at all since I watched her on Coutdown after school in the 90s. And how did the “Salter Air Fryer Cookbook” end up on there? The first book seems a solid recommendation though…

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