so…

20 Jun 2021

Published by Norman Walsh

So. I’m starting over.

This weblog⊕ is my space to ramble on in bursts longer than 140 characters. The opinions are my own^†. If you’d like to follow along, you can subscribe to one or more of several feeds. Or just click the links below, that works too. So does searching.

19 Jun 2021 at 19:46 UTC

A shout out to the student neighbors who, on one hot afternoon, created a stagnant pond in their garden with a large inflatable pool.

17 Jun 2021 at 16:22 UTC

“Tilt and turn” windows are cool, but I’m often startled by the lack of standardization (with respect to handle orientation). Half the windows in the house work one way, half the other.

17 Jun 2021 at 16:16 UTC

I'm continuing to make progress on XML Resolver 3.x. Today I pushed 3.0.1beta3 but, perhaps more importantly, there's now a sample app that demonstrates its features and how it works. Try it out and let me know what you think! Proper blog post in the works.

Recent posts

Schrödinger’s cat cluebox 20 Jun 2021
In Games: Can you rescue the cat?
Oranges preserved in brandy 20 Jun 2021
In Food: What do you do with a bumper crop of little oranges?
Releases. Lots of releases. 18 Jun 2021
In DocBook, Gradle, RelaxNG, XML, XMLResolver: Release the Krak…all the things! I’ve been pushing a bunch of related, if not exactly dependent, projects forward. I think I’ve pushed new releases of all of them now.
Towards XML Resolver 3.0.0! 03 Jun 2021
In XML, XMLResolver: I’ve pushed a snapshot release of XML Resolver 3.0.0. No, really, I actually mean it.
Towards XML Resolver 2.0.0 03 May 2021
In XML, XMLResolver: I’ve pushed a snapshot release of XML Resolver 2.0.0.
Testing NodeJS programs 12 Feb 2021
In NodeJS: In the NodeJS world, how do you manage dependencies during development and testing? (Resolved.)
Fifty ways 19 Jan 2021
In SelfReference: I am reminded of a quote from a film.
Thinking differently 15 Jan 2021
In SelfReference: You aren’t supposed to have noticed, but it’s all a bit different around here now.
SQL solution 31 Dec 2020 (updated 15 Jan 2021)
In SelfReference, TheWeb: The solution I settled on was a single database with two versions of the “main” table.
(ye)SQL 28 Dec 2020 (updated 15 Jan 2021)
In TheWeb: I have a small application that uses a PostgreSQL database. How does one manage “staging” versus “production” in such an environment?
Uploading applications 03 Nov 2020
In TheWeb: Every new project begins with writing tooling for the new project. Today’s diversion, a Gradle task to upload a web application. [Updated.]
Please pardon the dust 31 Oct 2020
In SelfReference: Over the next few days and weeks, I’ll be doing some remodeling.
Encryption at Rest? 26 Oct 2020
In Linux, SelfReference: Rolling my own security solution, in other words: doing it wrong.
Dash docsets on other platforms 22 Oct 2020
In Linux, MacOS, Windows, XML: A recent discussion on the XML.com slack channel made me aware of Zeal, a cross-platform viewer for Dash docksets.
On Fibonacci and tail recursion (and XSLT) 09 Oct 2020
In XSLT: A few observations about tail recursion and xsl:iterate in XSLT 3.0.
Saxon Chronicles 02 Oct 2020
In Saxon, Saxonica: Announcing a new weblog.
OCRing financial statements 22 Sep 2020
In XSLT: Sometimes (always, AFAICT) OCRing a PDF is the most reliable way to get transaction details out of financial institutions.
Catalog resolver migration 07 Aug 2020
In XMLResolver: Migrating your application from the Apache Commons catalog resolver to XML Resolver.
DocBook themes 03 Aug 2020
In DocBook: Adding support for dark mode as an aid to accessibility.
DocBook XSL: The Next Generation 25 Jul 2020
In Balisage, DocBook, XML, XSLT: A new implementation of transformations for DocBook in XSLT 3.0
An XInclude API for Saxon 09 Jul 2020
In Balisage, DocBook, XML: An XInclude processor for Saxon, including an extension function that can be called from XSLT stylesheets (and XQuery? I haven’t tried).
Dynamic profiles 08 Jul 2020
In DocBook: Composing documents based on run time parameter values.
What font is that in? 07 Jul 2020
In Balisage, DocBook: Missing glyph U+2BC3, you say? Ok. Where is it?
Documents that format themselves 05 Jul 2020
In XSLT: The xsl:evaluate instruction is interesting.
Five Interesting Things 29 Jun 2020
In Balisage, DocBook: A screencast teaser for my Balisage paper and a new project.
Documentation improves code 20 Jun 2020
In Balisage, Programming: It is an underappreciated fact that writing documentation improves your code.
XSLT Explorer 03 Jun 2020
In XSLT: Better understanding through static analysis. Not deep, serious static analysis, but a bit of XSLT on XSLT static analysis.
Unicode and Emoji 28 May 2020
In Emoji, Unicode: This morning, I tweeted about Unicode and emoji. Here’s a little back story and a few things I learned along the way.
DocBook Documentation 27 Apr 2020
In DocBook: Not documentation in DocBook, documentation about DocBook. Well, actually Documentation about DocBook in DocBook, but it’s the “about” part that’s most relevant.
“Chunking” DocBook 27 Apr 2020
In DocBook, XML, XSLT: Breaking large DocBook documents into pages for the web is just a little non-trivial. I’ve rewritten how it works in the DocBook XSLT 2.0 Stylesheets.

Alternatively · You might be looking for my previous weblog, my home page, my photos, or my itineraries. Or maybe you’re looking for my Micro.blog, Twitter, or GitHub pages? The XML Guild? Balisage? XML Summer School? Goodness, I don’t know. Is it silly travel maps you’re after? Or timezone details? Home made calendars? A clock? A countdown timer? Shoes or ships or sealing wax? Cabbages or kings? Maybe DuckDuckGo could help?

^†I work for Saxonica, but the opinions expressed here are my own, and no other party necessarily agrees with them. A full disclosure of my professional interests can be found on the author page.