About Me

PBX My name is Paul Bissex, and e-scribe.com is my consulting business. I build web applications using as much open source software as possible. From September to June I teach web design and other important non-photographic professional skills to photographers. In the '90s I wrote technology commentary and reviews for magazines, newspapers, and web publications, including Wired, Salon.com, FamilyPC, the late lamented Web Review, and the Chicago Tribune. Feel free to email me.

Book

I'm co-author of "Python Web Development with Django", an excellent guide to my favorite web framework. Its strong points include an introduction to Python, and better coverage of Django 1.0 than nearly anybody else. Published by Addison-Wesley, it is available from Amazon and your favorite technical bookstore as well.

Colophon

This runs on Django, served by Apache and mod_python. The database is SQLite. The operating system is FreeBSD, on a VPS hosted at Johncompanies.com. Comment-spam protection by Akismet. Vintage topo imagery from the Maptech archive. The markup engine is Markdown.

Pile o'Tags

Stuff I Use

Akismet, del.icio.us, Django, dpaste.com, Emacs, FreeBSD, Freenode, jQuery, LaunchBar, MacPorts, Markdown, Mercurial, OS X, Postfix, Python, SQLite, Subversion, TextMate, Trac, Ubuntu Linux, wmii

Spam Report

At least 59052 pieces of comment spam killed since January 2008, mostly via Akismet.

Kaypro model numbers

Apple customers have a long tradition of griping about Apple's silly naming policies. But I take it all back after going over this Kaypro timeline from the '80s. Let's see, in chronological order starting in 1982 we have:

Kaypro II (the first model, so naturally we call it "II")
Kaypro IV
Kaypro 10
Kaypro 4 (totally different from the "IV" of course!)
Kaypro 2 (totally... never mind)

This madness continued through several more models until the Kaypro 1 was released in 1986, at which point the company completely imploded, possibly due to a logic vacuum deep in its core or a breach in the space-time continuum.

Monday, October 3rd, 2005
fun + hardware