Older blog entries for bstpierre (starting at number 64)

Use Linux to build win32 installers for Python apps

A python-based project I’m working on has a win32 user that I need to support. Until yesterday I’ve been moving to a win32 laptop in order to run python setup.py bdist_wininst so I can...

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Syndicated 2011-07-20 15:00:36 from The Daily Build

Making perl unit tests easier to run in emacs

It’s a hassle to have to switch from emacs to the shell, run unit tests, pick out the failure, switch back to emacs, navigate to the line, forget where you were supposed to go, switch back, etc...

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Syndicated 2011-07-08 00:57:15 from The Daily Build

Make apt-get use an alternate sources.list

Since my company’s product is based on ubuntu, we use apt to distribute upgrades. We don’t normally want customers to pull upgrades from the upstream distribution, so we’ve pruned...

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Syndicated 2011-01-06 16:18:44 from The Daily Build

An Interesting pid File Race

ISC’s dhcpd uses this code to check for an already-running daemon: /* Read previous pid file. */ if ((i = open (path_dhcpd_pid, O_RDONLY)) >= 0) { status = read (i, pbuf, (sizeof pbuf)...

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Syndicated 2010-05-26 16:08:50 from The Daily Build

Using Lenny to Build Jaunty Packages

<shameless_plug> I’m in the middle of putting together packages for the analog call generator my startup is building. </shameless_plug> The process for building debian packages...

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Syndicated 2010-05-13 15:43:13 from The Daily Build

zsh history expansion

Exploring zsh features made me want to figure out some of the history-editing wizardry. (Bash has similar history tricks, I just never bothered to dive too deeply into them.) If you want to...

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Syndicated 2010-02-15 13:59:52 from The Daily Build

Data vs Code

I’ll take an array over a giant switch-case statement any day. The array definition will be more compact and easier to see all at once. Defining actions in an array enforces uniformity. You...

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Syndicated 2010-02-05 16:08:05 from The Daily Build

Set Your zsh Prompt

Since the beginning of time, all the cool kids have had really cool shell prompts. It's a great place to display helpful information, and zsh has features that let you have a flexible, informative,...

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Syndicated 2010-02-01 16:05:13 from The Daily Build

Insist on Automatic Tests

At some point your team is going to be gone. Not all at once (well, maybe, but in that case you won’t care), but over time turnover will completely replace your team. If you are the manager,...

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Syndicated 2010-01-29 19:08:08 from The Daily Build

Make the zsh zle handle “words” correctly

Snippet from my .zshrc: # This controls what the line editor considers a word. By default it # includes '/', which makes it so that when I M-del (attempting to erase # a directory in a path), I erase...

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Syndicated 2010-01-27 15:40:18 from The Daily Build

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