I’m all kinds of snob:  Bike snob, beer snob, whisky snob, shoe snob, pants snob (yes, pants), and much more.  I get called this by friends and family because nearly everything I own I’m particular about — I don’t just buy or wear stuff, I spend too much time researching, deeply assess a purchased object, [...]

Yes, I lied.  In the end, I kinda panicked and sent the phone back.
It was definitely a non-rational response, and I feel stupid-guilty about it, and I’m still not quite sure it was the right move.  The main reason I did so is because I just wasn’t sure, at least not enought to commit to [...]

I just got back from LISA, and as has happened for the last few years, I was pretty disappointed. I think the thing that sticks out the most is how isolated the community is.  Maybe it’s because I’m used to hanging out with developers, entrepreneurs, and Web 2.0 types, who are always looking for the [...]

This stuff drives me crazy.   (I can’t seem to say “drives me nuts” any more because of the damn joke.  That, and hanging out with too many Brits.)  I’m putting this post in ‘programmer therapy’ because it’s written more for me than for you, but maybe you’ll get something out of it.
Anyway, so I’m once [...]

Now that I’ve gone through the ISconf years (although it was really less than a year), it’s time to move on to how Cfengine affected Puppet.  There seems to be a pervasive belief that Puppet is an attempt to make a Cfengine++, and I’m hoping that this article will dispel that silly notion.
As mentioned previously, [...]

As many know, LinkedIn has finally added support for applications, and one of the first applications they’ve added is TripIt:
TripIt is my very favorite travel-related web site — I forward all of my confirmations to them and they automatically build a schedule with all of the confirmation codes and everything.  I print a copy of [...]

Well, I’ve had my gPhone (aka Android phone aka T-Mobile HTC G1) for about ten days, and after using it a lot and playing with a couple of iPhones a few times, I think I’m going to keep the G1.  And on a side note, I’m making an attempt, from now on, to make this [...]

I was asked recently for more information on Puppet’s history, and although it seems to me that I’ve talked about it plenty,  I guess I might not have written it all out, nor is it necessarily all in one place.  I’m relatively verbose, so this looks like it will be long enough to break into [...]