New Perspectives

Keyboard Maestro and MultiMarkdown

Moved to my more technical blog at JimSComputing

A tribute to a great man

Herschel Hayo

Less than a week after writing my article, Dennis M. Ritchie – a tribute I find myself writing another. This time it is much “closer to home” as it is a man I call my friend. Herschel Hayo was my boss’s boss so our friendship was not best buddies or anything. I’ve never been to his house nor he to mine and yet I think a great number of people in my position still think

of Herschel as their friend. He was that kind of person – no one was beneath him or unworthy of a smile and a chuckle.

Herschel was a good man and there are too few of them around. Even in casual conversation it was clear how much he thought of his family, and they of him. His wife, Barbara, would light up when she was with him after many years of marriage. That says a lot about a man.

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Dennis M. Ritchie – a tribute

In about 1985 I had the opportunity to learn the C programming language. This was a wholly remarkable language that let you get down with the computer at its own level without talking machine code. It was an exciting and different challenge for me from the standard “TRS-80 Basic” I had been used to. I was a Sophomore in college and this was a perfect diversion for a computer geek like me.

Everyone who has ever more than heard about C knows the only go-to source of all knowledge for it is the book “The C Programming Language”, known to C programmers as “K&R”. The R of K&R is Dennis M. Ritchie often known by his username dmr. Dennis Ritchie is also the creator of the C language.

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Using MultiMarkdown for Email

I have been fascinated with Markdown(MD) and MultiMarkdown(MMD) for months and yet have had little opportunity to use them. Sure I have created the occasional document with my favorite of the two, MultiMarkdown, and yet it is not enough to learn all the proper syntax. I most often want to use MMD with Email as that is the most common vehicle I have for quick and easy text that is not of epic length.

Until recently I had no decent solution for this. I would end up editing in TextMate and using the MMD bundle to Generate Output and Open in Browser menu option and then I could cut and paste from the browser into my email client. What a hassle!

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Review: LastPass – The Last Password You’ll Have To Remember

Ok, so last time I talked about security and how tough it is to pull off that level of safety. Well one tool that has done more than all the rest of them together for me is LastPass. I could write an entire book on LastPass but I’ll spare you all from that.

What Is It?
LastPass, oversimplified, is a multi-faceted program that lets you keep all of your passwords in an extremely safe manner. In the simplest terms it is a password vault type utility but it is much more than that! To use LastPass you install it (more later) and then any time you need a password you just log into LastPass with one password and it either provides the password to you or it securely inserts it into the website you are accessing.
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