...and they may well not be under your control Pretext I recently changed my job. Why? It made sense with a young family to try and cut the amount of travelling I was doing. I don't fly, but being away from them and burning a lot of diesel in the process made it a bit silly. Especially when you consider that I'm predominantly an experienced software engineer with a penchant for enabling others to…
Introduction One thing I've grown to love about managing a team of software engineers is that they call out the hand-wavey terms you use without thinking. This is not to say the terms are not well founded or even, arguably, used with a decent underpinning ethos in mind. It's more to say, be prepared to define something when you talk about it . Pipeline is a term that definitely fits this notion.…
Introduction I've decided to write this article because I hope it addresses some thoughts that others might well feel within themselves. Can I solve them? Probably not. I can elaborate as an elder millennial a relaxation of my opinions as time goes by. Being restrained In the last 20+ years of being a worker (not always in computing, but mostly) I've kept personal and professional fairly distinct.…
Welcome to 2025 So I never publish blogs when the publication date actually says in Lektor, they appear afterwards. This time, however, I start on the 1st of January and aim to have this done by the time I'm off of my paternity leave. Software engineering mixed with child rearing, this is the hippest place to be in 2025! That said, it offers an outlet for my ramblings that isn't my ever patient…
Julia: my introduction Julia is a language that I've been after getting better acquainted with for a while. I won't lie, I've actually tinkered with it several times, but now I have good reason at work to go in more deeply, so I am. I think I know enough to appreciate that Julia is an elegant and very powerful language, but I've not found the transition to a JIT compiled language easy to deal…
A software engineer is easily distracted Crapoly, it's been a long time since I wrote anything. Ho hum, it's mostly for me anyway (if not, and you like this, leave a comment!) If you get asked to lead a team, undertake challenging projects that aren't "the flavour of the month", or change your life circumstances, it could be the end of you doing serious "coding". Most people tell me all these…
Introduction I'm determined to continue writing publicly, but haven't been able to find much to focus on and understand in relation to my path. Perhaps, this is thanks to the uncertainty of that path, especially in my professional life. That needs sorting, but I love writing so decided to save ten tabs that I found interesting or at least slightly worthwhile from my phone. I don't like reading on…
Preamble I write from a position of privilege. This is an important premise to this piece to acknowledge, because it underpins the need to build my motivation. Reflecting on the topic herein has been important in addressing that not saying anything is far worse than the alternative: to have stood impassively at the watching, and feeding off of, technological development having without trying to…
As usual, all opinions are my own A prelude So this post is about why I've updated my about page , which probably seems pointless but actually is quite an achievement for me as I'm not predisposed to public writing unless it leaves out all semblance of personal information ( which hasn't, if I'm honest, done me any favours in the long run! ) There have been a few things that have tipped the…
Introduction Holiday and life has given a little break between the blog posts recently, but back to work today and I'm over the moon to be starting a new project in my role as RSE (rather than those I'm doing which are carried over.) There will be more on this technically without doubt, but I want to start with something more abstract and conceptual to write about, which arose during my first day…
Introduction My home office. Very lucky to have the dedicated space to keep work away from relaxation! So this week was my first as a Research Software Engineer for the British Antarctic Survey, whom I've worked for over the last five years in various roles. I'm keen to blog regularly about this, as I feel it's an important culmination of 20 years working in (and around) the tech industry, with…
So this is the last of the galleries from my time South. Though I did go again for a Halley summer in 2019-2020, I wasn't so active with the camera! These were fantastic seasons to be involved with. The shutdown of Halley in 2017 left a big gap in winter science, especially in the long running Dobson dataset, amongst others. The British Antarctic Survey, presented with unprecedented and…
With the start of the summer season well under way, I was privileged to get out as co-pilot on a couple of key flights. Firstly, to install the Fossil Bluff backup landing site, which was just a mind-blowingly good day out. Secondly, a trip to Halley as part of the season startup process (a team had already started work to start the season there) to start up some of the science devices we look…
As the sun returns, so too does the encroachment of the world into Antarctica, with the first planes arriving and the preparations for the upcoming summer season. That said, some of the fruitiest weather is into spring as the sun and the global weather systems push back slowly into the continent. The wonder of the station isn't lost in these times, as you reflect and enjoy life on base as much as…
I've been a bit offline whilst some life stuff has been happening, but here is the first of four (to be released daily) of the last of my Antarctic galleries. This is the record of my second winter trip. With the legendary field guide Dr Snow as my collaborator for the occasion, we decided to maximise recreational endeavours by staying in the hut in the recreation area and make daily trips out.…
The irony of this being called Winter Living as a post is that the first photo is already past the Winter Equinox. However due to the ship only having left in late May and with the lead up to the midwinters week off being so busy with gift making, this album really chronicles the first bedding in of the winter team in isolation. If you've missed the last post you can find it here , or if you've…
Having finished the winter trip a couple of months before, this gallery shows the lead up to and fun times of midwinter week in June, a celebration akin to Christmas for people in the Antarctic. Full of fun and celebration, everybody makes gifts for one another and enjoys a bit of time to relax, whilst the sun doesn't rise. If you've missed the last post you can find it here , or if you've been…
This gallery shows the more recreational side of the autumn at Rothera. The first of my winter trips as well as a shindig we put on in the Rothera garage. As we work hard, it's important to cut loose and have a break. The winter trips also provide the only respite from life on base for many, giving us an opportunity to go out and see the wider environment. It's a massive privilege to have been…
Yes, I know, it's amazing that there's a second gallery about the nature and environment of Rothera! This gallery accounts further amazing explorations of the local area whilst doing training and getting to know the team. Truly fantastic. I hope you enjoy the pictures as much as I enjoyed the opportunity that afforded my taking them! If you've missed the last post you can find it here , or if…
This gallery really just records my introduction into the life and the beauty of Rothera, having arrived in 2018 and getting myself settled as a new member of the team. The majority of the winterers spend the summers either side on the base you winter at, but since I and some others were doing our summer (which are generally intense at either base) at Halley, we had to adjust to the new base and…
This gallery shows the last photos I took at Halley while we prepared for the shutdown of the base for the second time. The winter season I was moving over to Rothera, a base I'd not yet visited but the other of the two wintering bases on the continent (and now the only inhabited BAS base on the continent during Winter.) Halley being on an ice shelf and Rothera being on the peninsula of the…
During the summer season 2017-2018 (remember, this is the Southern hemisphere) I was privileged enough to get out for some brief fieldwork. Also we have to ensure our training is kept up to date, which gave some opportunity for on-base shenanigans to simulate breathing apparatus based search and rescue. If you've missed the last post you can find it here , or if you've been ever so unfortunate to…
Following our being unable to winter Halley in the 2016-2017 season our team had to return to the UK, which was a massive shame. The prospect of spending winter at Halley in 2017 was most exciting. However, we were there to do a job and the right decision was made at the time, and it's afforded me many other opportunities! Returning to Halley roughly 9 months later was a great feeling, hopefully…
I've not yet been able to adequately post on here, primarily because I've not gotten comfortable with publishing my internal narrative. The brain is a strange place when confronted with isolation, which I know from previous, non-pandemic related experience. That said, I feel it worth having a bit of a ramble this morning, mainly to try and see whether I can write something that might be useful,…
Overview I've given in. It would be nice to have some analytics on the site and in looking for alternatives to Google Analytics I came across this very succint but informative comment on HN . Looking at Matomo it seemed like a good idea, I liked the "guarantee" that the self hosted option will be available for free, forever, without data leakage (hope this is true). However, THIS post about not…
Introduction This really culminates the articles "Making this site" ( part 1 , part 2 and part 3 ), surrounding the development of this blog. I've been terrible at getting round to doing this for a whole host of reasons, not least due to the onset of lockdown part two! Ansible is a tool I've been using for years, almost as long as I've been doing devops style stuff over "plain old" software…
It's been a bit busy recently but, now, I return to the blogosphere mainly as an escape from the insanity of modern life! There are a few things that I'm keen to solve, which I must admit I've not found intuitive to get my head round in Lektor just yet. I've not tried hard, but definitely if it's not immediately intuitive (or is outstanding from part 1 or part 2 ) then I fancy having a crack at…
These are some photos of my first season in Antarctica. This is partly a desire to develop the site more, but motivated mainly by a desire to share the wonderful experience I had. Hopefully these posts will serve inspiration or interest to budding technologists. It's important highlight that the possibilities are endless in life if we step out of our comfort zone once in a while. It's also…
I've no interest in writing about the positives or negatives of life lived under lockdown. Being in a pandemic, the world mostly knows what's happening as a result of recent events. I only hope that it afflicts fewer as time progresses, the world has enough to deal with. What I do want to write a little about, since this is the first time I've really thought about publicising my thought stream…
So, on I continue with making this site a bit more satisfying. It's one of those nice to get some dub on and just settle into something easy to achieve with minimal brainpower. Lektor Plugins lektor-tags So the first thing I've done is to try and use the lektor-tags plugin , which seems to work pretty well: it really is about just following the README! A couple of things I've noticed during this…
I had a good play with raw bootstrap based static sites, using Jinja. I played around with Jekyll in the first iteration of the site which I liked: I thought might be nice to learn Ruby off the back of that. But in reality these "nice" ideas always end up being more work than they're worth. To be honest I really like using Python, I don't need any more barriers to putting something. I don't like…
Welcome to Jims Blog. As I’m sure is so often the way for a life-long techie, I’ve been intending on doing this for years and just never really gotten round to it. I never really thought about what I might like to write! My experience is rooted in software development and for years and years I worked in organisations that didn't allow or need me to create a public presence. As it is I am still…