Hello and welcome!

Norman Walsh maintains this site. It used to be for publishing software and resources but, twenty odd years in [yes, twenty!], those are mostly distributed elsewhere. There’s some archival stuff here and a few odds and ends. The activity stream is the only thing that’s regularly updated. Enjoy your stay. If you're interested in the stuff here, you may also be interested in norm's weblog. Or not. Only you can decide.

You can also find norm on Twitter, GitHub, Flickr (but see also his own site), the book of face (rarely), LinkedIn, Google+, and probably a dozen other places too.

And now, for your amusement:

Norm's activity stream

10 Jan 2021
[T] tweeted“@xchaotic @cbiggins Soon. Soon. I believe I am finally finishing up the task.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@SheltieJim No harm done. And I had a good chuckle. 28,179 copies of the recipe for Flemish Chicken.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@cbiggins Test environment: "docker-compose down; rm -rf build/sql/data; docker-compose up -d; gradle load_data" Problem solved.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“Oooh! Rookie mistake! An SQL UPDATE statement without a WHERE clause. Fun times.”—@ndw
09 Jan 2021
[T] retweeted“RT @AdahopAda: Y'all. The constant jokes about Lindsey Graham being on Grindr or calling him "Lady Graham" are thinly veiled homophobia and…”—@ndw
08 Jan 2021
[T] tweeted“Earlier this afternoon, I pushed Saxon-JS 2.0.3 to the npm registry. No functionality changes; this release just up… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1347586480001191937”—@ndw
07 Jan 2021
[T] retweeted“RT @SketchesbyBoze: 2016: it’s only four years, how bad can it get 2021: are the armed insurrectionists storming the Capitol aware that th…”—@ndw
06 Jan 2021
[H] pushed gh-pages in qt4cg/qtspecs
[T] retweeted“RT @cstross: Sunlit uplands! https://twitter.com/EyeEdinburgh/status/1346565624013664256”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @MarilynSarelas: @Bamalady1960 Thank you Diane! The whole country is thanking Georgia voters! 💙🙏 Democracy has a chance now. #ByeMitch…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @lindyli: Pennsylvania’s GOP refused to seat a duly elected state senator today We cannot just move on from Trump. Trumpism remains ali…”—@ndw
04 Jan 2021
[T] retweeted“RT @jessesheidlower: This is very, very, very good. (Note to non-coders: there's a bug in the code, and the robots are in fact programmed…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @MaartjeME: Hey Twitter buddies! I am writing a course about doing Code Reviews for next semester. What would you as a (professional) d…”—@ndw
03 Jan 2021
[T] tweeted“In Gradle, you can capture the stdout of an Exec task with the “standardOutput” property. So, naturally, to captu… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1345800579080200192”—@ndw
02 Jan 2021
[T] retweeted“RT @TheHonorableAT: A white guy blew up an entire city block last week and took a major city off the grid and the news talked about it once…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @AtifRMian: 2021: Humanity faces a small test Vaccinate about 5 billion adults, at $20 per head for $100B Jeff Bezos could do it alone…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @jefposk: The four Senators-elect - Lummis, Marshall, Hagerty, and Tuberville - plus incumbent Senator Daines, are disputing their own e…”—@ndw
01 Jan 2021
[T] retweeted“RT @cmclymer: Janet Yellen got paid millions to speak to large groups of people about her life's work and renowned expertise? Good for her.…”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@jamescummings Yes, I think you're right. The reunification of Ireland, an independent Scotland and, with some real… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1345028830747095040”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“*grumble* I didn't notice the bug that caused the title to be repeated.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“Right then. Right then. Where's the petition to rejoin the EU? https://so.nwalsh.com/2021/01/01/093403”—@ndw
31 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“SQL solution. The solution I settled on was a single database with two versions of the “main” table. https://so.nwalsh.com/2020/12/31-sql”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @tonyhawk: at a Covid testing site (wearing masks), handing over paperwork for me & two of my kids: woman looking over papers: "okay...…”—@ndw
30 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“@masyukun Yeah, sure. But if, like me, you simply hoik up the stool to move it out of the [expletive] way, ...”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“Balance a bag of 💿 on top of the step stool. Place the step stool in front of the cupboard containing the cooking p… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1344373130538725376”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @AliMcCool88: Half of Trumps family has positions in the White House and y'all are making a big deal about Stacey Abrams having a sister…”—@ndw
29 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @NicolaSturgeon: Tory/Labour view is that all Scotland can aspire to is a ‘choice’ between a terrible deal we didn’t vote for and ‘no de…”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“I don't know who needs to hear this, but declining to invite someone to be a guest on your show is not "banning". N… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343939249138262016”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@steinarba No, I don't need to keep them in sync. I just need a scratch space to do editorial work that can then ge… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343853130157613056”—@ndw
28 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“@jer_s @jessesheidlower Yes, indeed. And lack of experience on my part may have lead me to make poor design choices… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343685630220402688”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@jer_s @jessesheidlower Apologies for the odd choice of terms. I understand the “status table” solution, but not ho… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343681000069607425”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@jessesheidlower Fair enough. What do you do about rows that have primary keys? So "id" is the primary key for a ro… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343652335831154692”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“(ye)SQL. I have a small application that uses a PostgreSQL database. How does one manage “staging” versus “producti… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1343649179973902338”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @iammightor: https://twitter.com/iammightor/status/1343153798265630720/photo/1”—@ndw
27 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @LinguaCelta: Just a normal note on a normal package here in Wales. https://twitter.com/LinguaCelta/status/1343175698693894146/photo/1”—@ndw
[H] pushed gh-pages in ndw/qtspecs-xslt4
[H] pushed master in ndw/qtspecs-xslt4
26 Dec 2020
[P] Photo“There’s a new sheriff in this...apron There’s a new sheriff in this...apron ”
[T] tweeted“@LinguaCelta Because nothing says "perfectly safe" like resting a popsicle stick on your thigh and then chiseling bits out of it.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“Absolutely fascinating: Reverse Engineering the source code of the BioNTech/Pfizer SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/reverse-engineering-source-code-of-the-biontech-pfizer-vaccine/”—@ndw
25 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“@aljopainter And there’s no emoji for them!!!”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“🥩 ✔️ 🍗 ✔️ 🥕 ✔️ peas ✔️ Brussels sprouts ✔️🥔 ✔️ 🍠 ✔️ Yorkshire puddings ✔️”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“Merry holidays to thems with holidays to celebrate, happy new year to thems with calendars that increment soonish and good cheer to all!”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @LinguaCelta: Nadolig Llawen to everyone who celebrates it! To everyone else, please have a nice, quiet couple of days. I hope you can…”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@dpawson Thanks, Dave! Happy happy to you and yours!”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“To my mother-in-law’s tremendous delight, I have managed this morning to ignite an oven mitt (while it was on my ha… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1342427575616987137”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @karayigitkizi: Harrison Ford is trending, which made me think of him beating the shit out of a Nazi.😍 https://twitter.com/karayigitkizi/status/1342261982964039681/photo/1”—@ndw
22 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @fairfightaction: BREAKING: 1,000,000 Georgians have voted early in person in the Jan 5 U.S. Senate runoff elections. Join your fellow…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @bocxtop: sorry i didnt respond to ur email in a timely fashion i literally cannot tell days apart anymore and thought today was 2 weeks…”—@ndw
[H] opened pull request in w3c/xslt30-test
[H] created branch qtspecs-21 in ndw/xslt30-test
[H] pushed master in ndw/xslt30-test
[T] retweeted“RT @BreeNewsome: The government is wasting billions of your tax dollars on needless weapons programs & large corporations that destroy the…”—@ndw
21 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @twcuddleston: gonna schedule this tweet to send every weekend now https://twitter.com/twcuddleston/status/1340327333501300743/photo/1”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @paulkrugman: Running joke that Rs don't do evidence-based policy, they do policy-based evidence. Except it's not a joke https://t.co/dT…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @stevesilberman: This! https://twitter.com/stevesilberman/status/1340493561431617536/photo/1”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @KevinMKruse: If you think I'm willingly going to read a single word about Martin Shkreli after this tire fire of a year, you're out of…”—@ndw
20 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“Holiday crisps? I am not, I confess, an aficionado of “cola” glaze on ham. The crisps are ok, though!… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1340728683217170434”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @AOC: One major difference between GOP and Dems is that GOP leverage their right flank to gain policy concessions and generate enthusias…”—@ndw
[P] Photo“Ham with Spiced Cola Glaze Ham with Spiced Cola Glaze ”
19 Dec 2020
[H] commented issue rougier/nano-emacs#28
[T] retweeted“RT @LinguaCelta: Formaldehyde is only needed for preserving fancy things. For anything else, use casualdehyde.”—@ndw
17 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @adamconover: Uber and DoorDash spent $200 million blanketing California with ads that claimed that unless Prop 22 exempted them from pr…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @CrookedKnight: I genuinely unabashedly love that this is now a picture of a future Secretary of the Interior https://twitter.com/CrookedKnight/status/1339665707882180617/photo/1”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @SoniaBaschez: *chef’s kiss* https://twitter.com/SoniaBaschez/status/1339027485002854402/photo/1”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @HackedOffHugh: “about $11 billion went to companies either run by friends and associates of politicians in the Conservative Party ..”Th…”—@ndw
[H] commented issue rougier/nano-emacs#28
[T] tweeted“@xmlgrrl @metadaddy @timbray @neilmaddog Go's parser is [expletive], I think. Dunno. I looked briefly the other day… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1339509603675959298”—@ndw
16 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @Plaid_Cymru: "The Tories at Westminster went from "Stay at Home" to "Eat Out to Help Out" to "Go Back to the Office" - the inconsisten…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @lkanies: Pfft. This is not gentrification. It is rampant destruction. SEO has made a huge portion of search results literally worthless…”—@ndw
[H] pushed gh-pages in qt4cg/qtspecs
[H] pushed gh-pages in qt4cg/qtspecs
[T] retweeted“RT @alunsaunders: Hey @BBCNews I’m not comfortable with it either and whilst I am fully ready for an #IndependentWales, right now Wales i…”—@ndw
[H] commented issue rougier/nano-emacs#28
[H] opened issue in rougier/nano-emacs
15 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @patio11: Startups are (by necessity) filled with generalists; big companies are filled with specialists. People underestimate how effec…”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @patio11: If you are attempting to hire for an engineering position, greater than 50% of people who apply for the job and whose resume y…”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“This whole thread is excellent. https://twitter.com/patio11/status/936615043126370306”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@LinguaCelta @rdeltour Well, I guess the lathe is what made the table round.”—@ndw
14 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“@shelleypowers Well, you did say “GOP”. Silly and pathetic (and also treasonous) seems to be their game.”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @JessLStanley: Please support those willing to stand up for truth and integrity. Protect whistleblowers.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@LinguaCelta Gee, thanks. 😁”—@ndw
13 Dec 2020
[T] retweeted“RT @mathling: Salamander clinging”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @robreiner: The battle for the Soul of the Nation continues. With the sedition of 18 states and 126 GOP Reps, it’s not North vs. South,…”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@aljopainter @Pminn76 @LinguaCelta I have many fond memories of my time there.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@aljopainter @Pminn76 @LinguaCelta I have left Texas behind me and live in Swansea now.”—@ndw
[H] pushed gh-pages in qt4cg/qtspecs
[H] pushed gh-pages in ndw/qtspecs-xslt4
[T] tweeted“@dpawson Unlike the lathe, which I couldn't hope to purchase before/until I have a proper workshop, I will buy a ro… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1338042119118872576”—@ndw
12 Dec 2020
[T] tweeted“@bitworking I can understand that.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“@patrickDurusau I think I’d actually be able to make more with a wood lathe, but the metal ones sure are cool.”—@ndw
[T] tweeted“There are many lessons one might learn from watching YouTube videos. I have learned that I want a lathe.”—@ndw
[P] Photo“Test image Test image ”
11 Dec 2020
[H] pushed gh-pages in qt4cg/qtspecs
[T] retweeted“RT @donwinslow: Can we not mince words? The 106 republican Congressmen are traitors.”—@ndw
[T] retweeted“RT @AriBerman: We cannot normalize how totally insane it is that Trump, 18 state AGs & 106 House Republicans still trying to overturn elect…”—@ndw

Announcements

15 Mar 2018

Converted to build with gradle; refactored a whole bunch of stuff. Hopefully I didn’t break anything. I did remove a bunch of cruft that appears to have been broken for years.

29 Mar 2015

I reorganized almost everything to be more mobile-friendly and responsive.

20 Oct 2011

I converted the repository where I store the sources for this site from Mercurial to Git. You aren't supposed to be able to tell. But if I'm wrong, please do tell me.

11 Aug 2006

I've just finished a complete redesign along the lines of the recent redesign of docbook.org. I think I've preserved all of the existing URIs, but let me know if you notice something missing.

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