Dented Reality

Author Archives: Beau

4 years on Automattic

On this day, 4 years ago, I started full time with Automattic. This is my 4th Automattiversary. I had already been on trial for 5 months by that point (since January), and had a good feel for the company and the other Automatticians. I knew it was where I wanted to be. So I accepted […]

10 Year Blogoversary!

10 years ago today, I posted my first blog post on this site. That’s pretty much forever on the internet, and I think it probably also makes me old. A lot has changed in the last decade, both on this website, and for me personally (and the world at large). Let’s have a quick look shall […]

Keyring Documentation

I’ve started putting together a Developer’s Guide to working with Keyring in your WordPress plugins and themes. Check it out. If you haven’t seen Keyring yet, then check it out at the WordPress.org Plugin Repository.

I Want to Love My Pebble

It’s true, I really want to love the Pebble that I got from being a Kickstarter backer. I want to, but right now I can’t. I can only like it. And I can like it a lot — there’s a lot to like! I have a computer on my arm! I can read text messages without […]

Import DokuWiki pages into WordPress

I used to maintain a wiki full of personal ideas using DokuWiki, but at some point just gave up with wiki syntax entirely. A few months ago when I was moving all of my sites and content over to a new server and trying to consolidate things as much as possible, I decided to import […]

Technology Startups As Military Special Forces

Anyone who works in a remotely corporate environment has no doubt heard a bunch of (often ridiculous) military metaphors describing business-as-usual. We’re divided into “squads” and talk about “strategic thinking” and “tactical mistakes”. We develop “mission statements” (more about that later) and managers demand that we “go in for the kill”, all the while referring […]

Pebble Ideas

I should be getting my Pebble soon, and I can’t wait. I don’t really care about the fancy watch faces, I care about bringing timely information and notifications out of my pocket and onto my wrist. As far a I’m concerned, this is one step closer to something like Google Glass.

Exploring a Neighborhood Like an Engineer

When I moved to Brooklyn in June, I decided that I wanted to get to know my new neighborhood reasonably well, reasonably quickly. Being an engineer, I figured a methodical approach was the best solution, so I got a map and got to work. Based on a rough understanding of what was where, and letting […]

Ready Player One — Ernest Cline (Book Review)

NOTE: I am fully aware that at times in the review below, I sound like a ridiculous book-critic or something. I do not care. Also, links to Amazon contain my affiliate id. A few weeks ago I attended the New York Times‘ TimesOpen Open Source Science Fair on behalf of Automattic/WordPress.com. As part of my “thank […]

TimesOpen Hack Day/Readtrack

On Saturday, I attended the 2012 New Times/TimesOpen Hack Day. It was a long day, but I had a lot of fun. I sat in on an intro session to Arduino which was pretty cool, and also a session on the EchoNest API, which I ended up using in my project. You can find out […]