Software History

I posed my Instagram followers a question via Instagram Stories: what questions do you have about my blog? The second question I was asked was what made me start this blog, which deserves a blog post in itself to answer properly.

Earlier this year I participated in an online coffee cupping session hosted by Steampunk Coffee. It was marketed as a crash course in coffee cupping because it is quite difficult to replicate the strict standards of cupping at home without the right equipment. Grinding various samples of coffee to a particular degree within a certain period of time is not easy; every cup needs to be the same, and so on. But it is to be expected that online cupping will not be perfect. I signed up to learn a lot about cupping. I learned how things should be done and various ways to do those things at home.

During this trip to San Francisco, I have visited many coffee shops. One of the coffee shops at the top of my mental list of places to go was Blue Bottle Coffee. On my most recent trip there -- during which time I had a delicious coffee -- I felt down. People were talking in the background, but the environment felt cold. Some people came in and picked up a pre-made coffee and left the store. It was relatively quiet. There were no opportunities to chat with new people.

The V60 and Kalita Wave are both pour-over brewing devices but each has a unique design and required technique. In my most recent post for the Steampunk Coffee Blog, I dive deep into the similarities and differences between the V60 and the Kalita Wave, with reference to the design, technique, and cup profiles associated with each brewer.

While both the Chemex and the V60 are both cone-shaped pour-over devices, the devices are distinct, both in terms of design and the final cup profile. In my latest blog post for Steampunk Coffee, I talk about the similarities and differences between the V60 and Chemex. I also share some of my experiences from using both of these devices.

I am writing a blog post every day from December 1st to December 24th, 2021, about a blogger whose writing or site I follow. My aim for this series is to help you discover new blogs and to help get the word out about content creators whose blogs I appreciate. You can read more about this series in the inaugural Day 1 post.

I am writing a blog post every day from December 1st to December 24th, 2021, about a blogger whose writing or site I follow. My aim for this series is to help you discover new blogs and to help get the word out about content creators whose blogs I appreciate. You can read more about this series in the inaugural Day 1 post.

This post was going to begin with

Over the last few weeks, I have been cupping at home by myself to help me refine my palate. But, I have found myself thinking about how nice it would be to have someone else with whom to cup. I recently attended a Steampunk Coffee online cupping session which brought this idea to life. During the cupping, I learned a lot about how to taste coffee, how coffee is purchased and processed, and more.

Most labels on bags of speciality coffee contain quite a bit of information about the origin of the coffee, the flavours you may be able to taste in the coffee, and how the coffee was processed. Coffee roasters often display even more information on their websites. It took me a while to learn what all of the words meant and why they were important to me as a coffee drinker.

Over the last week or two, the weather has been steadily improving. The sunny weather inspired me to try making an iced coffee at home. I was able to make a few tasty iced coffees. Then, I thought about adding milk. My recent French press frothing technique came in handy and after some testing I made an iced latte with which I was happy.

In my second post for Steampunk Coffee, I shared a few thoughts on cupping at home and what I learned from one of my recent home cuppings.

What are the advantages of grinding coffee yourself? How do electric and hand grinders compare? What should you think about when you make a decision on what grinder to buy? These are the questions I address in my latest article for the Steampunk Coffee Blog.

TL;DR: I now have my own DNS resolver at jamesg.blog with some fun utilities. Read the GitHub documentation for a complete reference manual of all queries, and keep reading below for an explanation of the project and how it works.

In my latest coffee chat I talk with Louisa, a self-proclaimed coffee snob, about her blog, Coffee Snob Blog. We chat about Louisa's inspiration, how she feels cafes can elevate your mood, and how much time she spends working on her blog. The interview is below.

Black Pine Coffee is one of the many independent speciality coffee shops that make up the thriving and growing Glasgow coffee scene. Black Pine Coffee serves blend of coffee they designed with The Good Coffee Cartel, retail coffee from a rotating selection of roasters, sweet treats, and toasties. In this interview, I chat with Pete, the owner of Black Pine Coffee, about what it's like to run the store.

Yesterday I walked on a new path, eager to explore my local area more. My route was a mystery. I reveled in the excitement of new sights to see. As I walked further, I entered a wooded area. I reached a hill; the gradient was steep, but I was unbothered. I was strolling, leisurely, observing the flora and fauna around me.

My go-to drink at speciality coffee shops is the cappuccino. It has been months since I last had a cappuccino and I wondered to myself whether I could make one at home (without an espresso machine). After some research online and subsequent experimentation, I found a recipe for an at-home cappuccino which works for me.

One of the little moments of joy I experienced while in Berlin last year happened near Brandenburg Gate. I was walking through the Tiergarten, after having walked a lot that day. If I recall correctly, my ankles were a bit tired. On vacation, I tend to spend a lot of time on foot, eager for new adventures. On my way toward Brandenburg Gate, I started to hear a sound. It was the song Hallelujah being played softly. A woman's voice was signing in the background. I could hear a guitar.

I was walking through the shopping centre, speaking, when I heard a song in the background, playing through the speakers at a tone loud enough that I could hear it but not so loud the music was the only part of the environment on which I could focus. As soon as I heard the music, my mind leaped into action, noting

Note: I wrote this blog post before Christmas 2020 and never got around to publishing it at the time.

Breakfast and Coffee is a place to share information about breakfast and coffee shops you have visited, with a twist: where possible, contributions should come from personal websites rather than directly through the website editing interface. Breakfast and Coffee is a MediaWiki. This gives the site a lot of features like categories, a good page editor, and edit tracking out of the box. But, the site accepts Webmentions. When Breakfast and Coffee receives a webmention, it tries to create an entry on the wiki.

I took the bus back to the Edinburgh City Centre from the airport today, after my flight from Berlin. The tram had just departed and I thought the bus would be quicker. I carried my suitcase onto the bus, lifted my suitcase onto the luggage rack, then sat down. A few moments later, two young women boarded. I would guess they were around my age. They sat down and started conversing in German. I gazed out the window and watched people walk past.

I shared a few photos from my trip in Berlin on my notes blog yesterday. I realise I have a few more photos to share. I thought I would do that here so that they appear on my main blog (this one!) and in the feeds of all of those that subscribe to the blog.

I am experimenting with statistical next word prediction. My goal is to build a system that can accurately answer a question given a corpus of text. For now, my system is producing interesting summaries of content. Below is a summary of my post on the joy in listening to songs you used to love from a few days ago, generated by the tool I am building.

The Cheapshot cafe in Edinburgh caught my eye online because it is the size of a police box. Curious about its origins and size, I decided to reach out to Mel, the present operator of Cheapshot. Mel kindly answered a few of my questions about Cheapshot for this blog. Below is our interview.

One of the cafes on my

Over the last few months, I have spent a lot of time thinking about, talking about, and building a search engine. The search engine was first designed for my blog and then I expanded it into IndieWeb Search, a search engine for the IndieWeb community. Working on this project has been interesting but also challenging. Search involves solving many different problems, even if your intention is only to build a search engine for your own website.

I was sad to see that the Beaker Browser project has now been sunsetted. Beaker did great work on building concepts related to a read-write decentralized web. Beaker showed that there is a lot of room for exploration in browsers. The notice that the project had been sunsetted, while unfortunate, was a pleasant read.

I love reading cafe reviews and so I was thrilled to discover Double Skinny Macchiato, a site that often reviews coffee shops around the U.K.. I recently got the chance to speak with Bex, the author of Double Skinny Macchiato, about her blog, how she came up with the name Double Skinny Macchiato, and more. The interview is below.