Rob Dip

Data Visualization: attribute types and their graphical elements

There are two main types of data: categorical and ordered. From all the graphical elements that can be used to present data visually, some are naturally best fitted for categorical data and some others for ordinal data.

By identifying your data types and using the right graphical elements to display them, you can communicate information in a clear way.

Archive

Sabbatical

After almost 4 years, I resigned from my job to start a 6-month sabbatical. Here are my plans

Scheduling jobs with launchd and friends

Quick and dirty guide to scheduling and debugging jobs in macOS with launchd and utilities that interface with launchd.

Comparing files line by line with diff

Explaining the diff command line tool, one line at the time

Inspecting network usage with iftop

Brief, example-driven overview of iftop, the program to visualize packets in your network

Managing processes with htop

Brief, example-driven overview of htop, the program to visualize and manage system processes

Getting better at team communication

A writedown of my personal experience finding ways to communicate in teams, specially remotely

Fuzzy finding everything with fzf

An example-driven post featuring fzf, a flexible command-line fuzzy finder

Going over Git history with tig

An overview of tig, a text-based interface for Git

SCUMM internals and syntax for the sake of nostalgia

An overview of the syntax and broad aspects of the popular gaming engine

Jumping directories with z

Navigating directories have never been easier with z, this post describes how to use it and how it works

Processing JSON with jq

An example-driven overview of the jq command using NASA NeoWs API

Memories of writing a parser for man pages

Details about the behind the scenes of man pages: groff, macros (mdoc & man) and more.

Concurrency != Parallelism

A five-minute overview of the differences between concurrency and parallelism.

Rediscovering make: automatic variables

An overview of GNU make automatic variables and helpers to make them easier to grasp

Rediscovering make: the power behind rules

An overview of GNU make rules: targets, prerequisites, special targets and more

Overview of Elixir executables

A short intro to Elixir escripts, what they are, how they integrate with mix and why you should avoid using archives.

A brief dive into the Pony programming language

General overview with code samples of the Pony programming language

Error Correcting Codes and Reed-Solomon

A conceptual overview of how Error Correcting Codes and Reed-Solomon works

Get to know the Actor Model

A gentle introduction to the foundational concepts of the Actor Model with JavaScript

Bootstrapping a JavaScript Library

Quick and concise guide to creating and organizing your first JavaScript library