Hence I wrote a quick and dirty Python script which allows you to do just that using libgreader. You can find it on Github and it has few other features like exporting all feed articles. Who knows how long Feedburner will be around so next step will be resolving those links.

My current backup amounts to almost 500MB so script is obviously useful to me. Hopefully it is also to others.  If you find bugs or data that is not exported, but should be, please do let me know.

I am also looking for a good alternative that is not hosted only service, supports archiving and can process most feeds. Currently I am biased to modifying Newsblur to support tagging and running my own instance, but I would definitely prefer to avoid this work if possible.

This matters because images are together with Javascript main cause for ever larger page sizes which leads to slower websites, especially in low-bandwidth environments. But really, don’t we all want our websites to be as fast as possible?

image-diet was inspired by ImageOptim and Trimage and I’m grateful to authors of both. It uses jpegtran, Jpegoptim, Gifsicle, OptiPNG, AdvanceCOM PNG and Pngcrush to do the heavy work of squeezing redundant bytes. Getting them should be easy as they are part of Ubuntu distribution and can be installed on Mac with brew. For more information please check documentation or ask.

I would love to hear any comments and ideas you may have, even more so if you try it.

I suspect I also didn’t read as many tech books as I wanted because I mostly buy them in electronic form and don’t enjoy reading books on computer screens including tablets. E-ink readers are nicer, but underpowered and have issues displaying code samples well. Postponing decision is not working out, but I’m not happy with existing choices. Not sure how this will be resolved or when.

Links in the list still point to Amazon, but without affiliate IDs and are as always present only for those that are at least fine. Bold is reserved for those I found best: The White Tiger, Safe Area Goražde, Bright Earth, Next World Novella, Behind the Beautiful Forevers and The Sense of Ending. If you are a web front-end developer, then you should also look at Undercover User Experience Design and SMACSS.

The list:

1. The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga. I bought this book by mistake and don’t regret it. An astonishing and brutal portrait of India’s underclass that grips you and doesn’t let go even after you finish its last page.
2. Undercover User Experience Design by Cennydd Bowles & James Box. Excellent guide on doing UX on the cheap that is also a good introduction to UX. There are few people who couldn’t learn something from this book.
3. The Redbreast by Jo Nesbø. Gripping enough if you don’t mind in-text ads for previous books or genre tropes. A good book for beach, if you are into that sort of thing. I don’t see myself reading another one from this series.
4. Safe Area Goražde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995 by Joe Sacco. Certainly one of the best graphic novels I’ve ever read which can teach something about conflict even those who have been following it closely. Deserves all awards it got.
5. Object-Oriented Javascript by Stoyan Stefanov. An introduction book to Javascript (in browsers) best suited to programmers of other languages. Chapters about classes and inheritance are good reminders of less often used parts for intermediate Javascript developers.
6. The Habit of Art by Alan Bennett. Multi-layered drama with much humor. I saw its original production and I still think of it often.
7. The Stone by Marius von Mayenburg. A recurring motif of modern German literature – doubtful memories of recent past. I would love to see it on stage.
8. We’re with Nobody: Two Insiders Reveal the Dark Side of American Politics by Alan Huffman & Michael Rejebian. An interesting first-person look at how background researchers work in US politics without sordid details.
9. In a Strange Room by Damon Galgut. A book about traveling, un-articulated rootlessness and failed human connections that switches remarkably well between first-person and third-person narrator. It brought up some of my own almost forgotten memories and I would recommend it without hesitation.
10. Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. I don’t really know what to think of this book. It’s well written, engaging and reading it I do not not feel like time was wasted. On the other hand I don’t see depth others see or a master writer others describe. Still not a bad book to pick up.
11. Bright Earth by Philip Ball. I bought this book after I heard his talk on the same subject but still missed that it is foremost about painting colors. It is an amazing book which has significantly changed my perception and understanding of paintings and I would recommend it to anyone remotely interested in colors or visual arts.
12. Tempo by Venkatesh Rao. Venkatesh’s blog is among the most interesting ones I follow, but I was less impressed with this book on role of tempo in our lives and ways to work with it. There are certainly interesting ideas in it, but it often felt disconnected and too full of new jargon. I suspect I need to read it again with more focus and fewer interruptions.
13. The Long Earth by Terry Pratchett & Stephen Baxter. The first book in upcoming trilogy. Fun to read and well thought through look at what could happen if we suddenly had infinite natural resources.
14. Innumeracy by John Allen Paulos. Easy and interesting read, but it’s not clear to me what the purpose of the book is. It’s unlikely to be read by those who need it most or offer much in ways of tools and techniques. It is more of a cautionary tale of mistakes and lament about state of affairs which is still the same.
15. How to Disappear: Erase Your Digital Footprint, Leave False Trails, and Vanish without a Trace by Frank M. Ahearn & Eileen C. Horan. A warning book for those who are not particularly paranoid and less useful as a how-to. The rest of us largely won’t be surprised although you might find out a thing or two. I hated author’s voice.
16. Next World Novella by Matthias Politycki. A beautifully written multi-layered book about death, marriage, loneliness, memories… One of those rare books that not only can be re-read, but should be.
17. SMACSS by Jonathan Snook. A guide to writing modular CSS that should be easier to maintain and more reusable. A must read for web developers even if they don’t agree or use all described techniques.
18. Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo. A devastating, uncompromising and well-researched look into life in an Indian slum. Together with White Tiger it significantly influenced and informed my view of India and I wholly recommend it.
19. Dodger by Terry Pratchett. An enjoyable and informative recreation of Victorian London with a story a bit too predictive, straight-forward and far fetched for adult readers. Read only if you’re Terry’s fan or not an adult.
20. The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. Opinions may vary, but I recommend it without reservations. Really well written and was able to evoke memories of my youth without really describing it. I enjoyed reading it till the surprising and devastating end. Doubtlessly I will read it again.

This year? More useful education, more foreign literature and hopefully one or two longer ones that have been on the shelf for a while.

Related articles

• Books I read in 2011 (markos.gaivo.net)
• Books I read in 2010 (markos.gaivo.net)
• Books I read in 2009 (markos.gaivo.net)

Mine started as it ended, in bed with a nasty cold. We were in one of few places in Slovenia where there was snow, great weather and I got to experience it all mostly through windows. In a way it was a perfect sum of last year: missed opportunities and unexpected disappointments, but at the same time actually quite good if looked at from a different perspective. 2012 was a year full of health scares, not all of which were resolved happily (so far). I certainly hope this year will be better for my loved ones.

I learned last year that I don’t miss Twitter. Occasionally I read Fry‘s stream, but otherwise end up there only by mistake. There’s still work to be done on how to manage empty distractions and I miss tools that would help me decide what to read and how much of it. Facebook account — also gone (I hope; who can really tell?). Rarely used, never missed and incompatible with my convictions.

Digital sabbath continues to be a great idea and I can’t recommend it enough. Setting too ambitious personal goals…to be avoided. Explicit goals can lead to worse results when it becomes clear they can’t be met, even more so if they morph from a metric to a substitute of original purpose. Knowing this I nevertheless managed to become a textbook case of a goal-induced failure and will need to spend quite a bit of effort to get in a better shape. Need to keep focusing on whys too.

Having a list of possible and finished projects on wall still frees my mind. I have just released one of them, but it is obvious I haven’t really stayed the course this year, switching projects with predictable result of finishing few and losing a bet with Sebastjan. You could look at it as the most expensive dinner of my life (if valued by time spent) or a hell of a good investment in code I will use this year. I prefer the latter (and what kind of twat would object to paying friend’s dinner).

I actually did work on my personal research agenda in my spare time. I just don’t have enough of it and it is what I struggle with most. I found development proceeds more smoothly when done regularly, but to do that I need to maintain a very detailed to-do list which allows me to make a meaningful contribution even when there is only half an hour to spare. I have also added reminders to my calendar to regularly review (or re-awake) my work.

I decided to stop using these end of year posts for commenting on external developments. So far mostly impotent protests in Slovenia left a bittersweet taste. I am curious what this year will bring, but these reviews tended to be bleak and I’m not becoming an optimist.

I am happier. It really is a privilege to, not just nominally, work with and for people from whole planet on stuff that matters. I learned a lot as person and a developer from my colleagues and I enjoy my work as much as when I started. However getting accustomed to our way of doing things and things we do can create a small worry of where I will be able to work, if I ever have to leave.

It was definitely a year of personal change. Not sure who to “blame” for rediscovering a radical streak in me, but I am less willing to be silent when encountering prejudice and small-mindedness. Silence condones and some troubles should be embraced.

This year I would like to finish existing projects that already have good foundations and to promote building web services for low-bandwidth environments (where low-bandwidth doesn’t mean just slow). That really should be enough. I expect it will be an interesting year.

I really shouldn’t have to explain privacy standpoint of this. Describing my life and immediate environment in detail to a bunch of people I have never met, some of whom don’t even work for the company yet and trusting all of them that they will not compromise it for as long as they will keep it is to me self-evidently moronic.

But I also avoid such hardware even when data in question might not be particularly sensitive. If I am paying for something to be manufactured, then I expect to own it. If a gadget depends on an external service to be useful, then I am really only leasing it. Services disappear for many reasons and it doesn’t make much sense to rely on their availability unless you can host them yourself. I loath ads, but paying for a service is not a guarantee for its continuing presence either.

I am not against functionality that reasonably requires at least occasional connection to grid. Most social features probably do. Products like phones don’t even make sense without network. Web interfaces certainly do make these devices cheaper and more quickly evolving. So there are certainly good reasons beyond roping you in to make them partially off-loaded on web.

However I don’t want to use those features and I certainly don’t want to give up data I care about for features I don’t. What I expect from devices I buy is my control of data and purchased functionality without others meddling or peeking over my shoulders.

The above linked articles are really worth reading, but hopefully I won’t do them too much of disservice if I sum them up with: 3D printing will be too costly, too difficult, not useful enough and of too low general quality to have the same pattern of adoption as 2D printers which means they won’t end up in every home (with some type of computer).

Each of these points is true right now. It costs more to print an otherwise mass produced item (especially if you need to also buy a 3D printer). Of course this becomes less relevant if you want to create things that are not mass produced (or at all), but even then you would be better off using an existing printing service (as I did). However cost of printers and materials have come down tremendously in last few years and it’s not difficult for me to imagine that at some point they will become accessible enough to become an impulsive buy. If we only bought stuff we need when it makes rational economic sense, we would own far fewer things than we do. Often they just have to become cheap enough and as cars attest that doesn’t even mean cheap.

It is also true that preparing models for printing is not easy. However it is much easier than it used to be and I don’t see why it wouldn’t become even more so in the same way as have tools for other once specialist tasks (like photo editing). I am old enough to remember word processing of mid 80-ies and as much as incanting commands was unappealing then, you don’t see many people needing to struggle with this today. And there could be even more help in form of existing downloadable designs or 3D scanners which could reduce burden of design from scratch to making small corrections instead.

Will we need printers often enough? No idea. I print on paper only before traveling and would likely use 3D printer more often, but I suspect I represent mostly me. I don’t know why anyone would still need a printer, but enough of them do that there is no shortage of models aimed at home owners. I did notice how my brush with 3D printing changed the way I perceive plasticity of my environment and while it is hard to tell how my view and use would be shaped if printing was even more accessible (I expect more things would get fixed instead of replaced), it is even harder to imagine that they wouldn’t. I am sure this would be even more true for kids growing in environment which is more pliable than today’s.

An often repeated argument is that quality of printed stuff is not high enough. This may well be in most cases, but I expect will be less so over time. I don’t expect cheap printers or materials to catch up with expensive brethren or other options anytime soon if ever, but they may not need to. Illuminated manuscripts were supplanted by printed books even though they never achieved their quality. Books simply became good enough. As millions of Instagram photos prove deficiencies can also lead to its own esthetic (but I wouldn’t count on this).

It is difficult if not foolish to predict future of a particular technology, but when I do attempt it, I try to do two things. One is to list all its current limitations and try to imagine a future without them. If technology is not interesting enough without them, then it’s really hopeless. The other thing I do is to look at development so far and try to extrapolate what will happen to those limitations and how soon from technological and wider social context stand point.

I don’t expect 3D printing to follow an adoption curve of some other technology as this rarely happens. There is indeed a fundamental difference best captured by Jon Evans’ observation that we print on paper to convey information and use 3D printers to produce stuff. I do believe home 3D printers will eventually be at least as prevalent as paper printers if for no other reason because our appetite for stuff won’t go away as much as our need to use paper as a transport medium. However I also expect them to be present in houses void of geeks.

But my real point is that this doesn’t really matter. It seems there is an agreement that this technology together with others will radically transform our society and that bespoke manufacturing for individuals will again become more prevalent. Unless your business model absolutely depends on pushing millions of these printers in every home, does it really matter if I will print my designs on my printer or at a nearby corner shop?

I don’t think it does as I don’t care if additive approach of printers wins over subtractive one of mills (however I find grinding inherently less appealing). In any case I do expect personal manufacturing to influence but not eradicate manufacturing industry and it will be interesting to see how much of it will see it as a threat needed to be countered.

I tried to solve my problem using SQL, but I could not. I am not saying it can’t be done, but with my limited knowledge of SQL I could not produce a query that would not perform horribly. Working on production database under heavy use made this a real no-go.

After trying to come up with pure solution I finally gave up and decided to solve this problem pragmatically with some scripting. Turns out that too was more complicated than necessary. Unix shell tools are all you actually need, provided your dataset is not too big for your computer limitations (mostly memory).

Instead of searching for those rows directly, I changed my plan to create two sets of rows, first containing all possible candidates and second containing those from first set which are pointed to from first table. Subtracting second set from first would therefore give me exactly those rows which aren’t pointed to.

If file all contains a row-per-line list of all candidates and linked a similar list of those that are linked to, then you can get non-linked by running following command:

cat all linked | sort | uniq -u > non_linked

What this does is following. Sort will put duplicated rows together and -u option of uniq will display only unique lines which are those that can be found only in all. Problem solved.

Passion is a symptom, not a diagnosis.

I know a great developer with whom I would love to work again who is passionate about electronics. I am sure he likes programming and does it a lot, but it’s not where his heart truly lies. Which is alright because his other qualities more than make up for any passion deficiencies.

Passion in complementary direction is doubtless a positive signal, but I simply do not believe that only people working on something they care deeply about are able to do it well. We can and do regularly care, with some degree of autonomy, about more than one thing (or person).

In more general sense my feeling is obviously a reaction to the end result of a process in which a useful guideline calcifies into dogma. Ideally I could get to this point sooner, but it seems unlikely. If I regularly reconsidered and doubted every piece of my mental framework, then it would mostly be mental and not much of a framework.

I am not sure why I was so tired. We did spend quite a lot of time trekking, but not really more than we are used to. I suspect it had something to do with high altitude and sheer amount of information my brains tried to digest. A month of travel may sound long^[1], but it’s really too short to get to know a country especially one so big and unfamiliar as Bolivia. Best you can hope for is to learn enough to give your ignorance a bit of  a shape.

It is also too short because you will need more time than you expect. One advice you hear often is that something will go wrong. It happened to us too and though you can be disappointed at times, you’ll mostly have fun, be amazed^[2] and sometimes even shocked. Our schedule was packed and it will take me months to process all that we have seen and experienced, but I hope we can return soon.

Finding reasons to visit Bolivia is easy. Finding help for organizing this trip may prove more difficult. Pick an agency and search will turn up somebody who had a horrible experience with them. Not us though. We met amazing people who really worked hard to make our trip unforgettable which leads me to real reason for writing this post.

If you intend to go and would like some local help, here are our recommendations.

There is no shortage of hotels in La Paz and mid range hotel Rosario has deservedly consistently high reviews. It has great front desk staff (especially Ximenia), nice rooms and location. Dinners are consistently great too, but I would avoid lunch. Same kitchen but apparently different team and what you get might not be exactly what you ordered.

America Tours is a travel agency recommended by Lonely Planet which can help you organize your way around country. Speed with which they were able to organize alternatives to our cancelled our trip to Madidi (thanks Amazsonas for nothing) was simply amazing.

Most people who visit Potosi stay in town. It’s certainly cheaper than alternatives, but if you can afford it, then a good place to stay is at hotel museo Cayara that is about half an hour drive away. Museum and a chance to talk to Arturo alone are worth it. Hacienda that has been there since 1557 is in the middle of beautiful nature and away of polluted surroundings of Potosi and is a popular destination for daily trips organized by travel agencies in Potosi (a good alternative for those on small budgets).

Usual way of seeing the largest salt flat in world is to travel to Uyuni and take a trip with one of many unreliable operators who are often hostages to their prone-to-drinking drivers. I believe it is better to travel to Tupiza (if you have time) and take a slightly longer tour. We had really good experience with Tupiza Tours, but my advice to those who prefer email for arranging their trips, is to start at least a couple of weeks before they go because girls at Tupiza Tours seem to be swamped in work. Or call them if you can. If you pick them, then ask for Hernan Cordova, the best off-road driver we have ever met (and Spanish speaking guide), and Jeaneth Menchaca Condori if you need an English speaking guide. They went above and beyond their duty, really made every effort to anticipate our wishes and needs and had an unlimited amount of patience.

There are many agencies in La Paz that will take you trekking and prices vary significantly. Andean Summits is certainly not among the cheapest, but they are very professional and accommodating (like with our last minute request to change dates of our trek). Ask also for Gustavo Miranda Hulliri, who apart from being a great cook and camp manager also seems to know every path there is. This can be really useful if you, say, get really weak because you were throwing up all previous day.

Tourist guides in Bolivia have to be certified. Most of them studied tourism and are very good. Still we were especially impressed by Julia Catunta Janco who consistently surprised us with showing us things we wouldn’t even think of asking. She would be our first choice unless you go climbing. Contact me if you need her email address.

One sure sign that your guide was really good is that saying goodbye feels like leaving a good friend. It is a feeling we didn’t expect before, but felt repeatedly once we were there. Life is too short to visit every place we would like to see, but I still have no doubt that we will return. I hope this post has been of some help to those of you who might be thinking of visiting Bolivia.

1. Popular stereotype of a Japanese tourist used to be someone who took pictures non-stop. Someone explained to me once that this is a necessary memory aid for short vacations with packed schedule because it can help you recall and organize memories later when you’re back. I don’t know if this is true for Japanese, but it is certainly true for me.↩
2. I knew Bolivia was rich in minerals, but I had no idea that there were so many mines which often exist in the most inhospitable places. Even big scale mining (such as for silver around Potosi) is usually done individually and this is even more true for small mines where there may be only 10 or so miners risking their life. It’s very hard and often short way to live that can still be better than alternatives.↩