adamyonk's posterous

On Christmas Eve 1968, the astronauts of the Apollo 8 mission read from the first part of Genesis during a live television broadcast from lunar orbit. A Japanese correspondent staying at a Houston hotel while covering the mission called NASA Public Affairs to request a copy of the speech that the astronauts were reading. The Public Affairs official asked where he was staying and then told him that if he opened the desk drawer in his room he would find a book and that he should open it to page one. The reporter found the Gideon Bible and later reported that "NASA Public Affairs is very efficient - they had a mission transcript waiting in my hotel room."

- From Gideons International on Wikipedia

I use a Mac, I write code most of the day, to me, 'killall' isn't a death threat. Despite that, I hope I can bring a few tips or tricks to the masses. Here it goes.

Simplify
I hear people complaining about how their computers are so slow and crawl through the day while doing simple tasks such as email and web browsing at a snail's pace. Almost all of the time this is probably a very avoidable problem. First..

Look at how many applications you're running. Chances are you aren't rolling a super computer, so don't treat yours like one. I see my colleagues leaving apps like Photoshop, Fireworks, Illustrator, and multiple browsers open all at once, all day. If you're not using it, quit it.

How many web pages do you have open? Modern browsers have the ability to have several windows open at once and usually organize them into tabs. Amazing, right? Just because this cleans your screen up doesn't mean it cleans your processor up. If you're not going to read it right now, bookmark it for later.

Can you see your desktop background? That picture of your dog or children does actually want to be seen. I suggest using your desktop as a sort of 'inbox'. Only files there that you're working with right now or will be working with soon. Once they're no longer of use, trash or file it. A cluttered desktop can slow down your computer and a clean one will, at the very least, clear your mind.

Get in the cloud
Hard drives fail. Spinning hard disks are on their way out. They'll soon be replaced by the new SSDs that have no moving parts, but for most of us, while they still cost 4-5X what a regular ol' hard drive costs, we're stuck with our (not so) trusty spinning disks. Back that sucker up.

I've recently started keeping all of my work files in Dropbox. I have the Dropbox folder in my dock for quick access and do all of my work out of there. If at any given time my computer bites the dust, I have exact copies of all of my work and important files backed up and available instantly online. No relying on scheduling backups or keeping track of thumb drives, just done, instantly.

I use Gmail for my email (as everyone should). It syncs to my local Mail.app via IMAP. Again, should the worst happen to my computer, all of my emails, drafts, folders, are all online and available from any computer connected to the internet.

Google Voice is new — It's not for everyone, but I use it and like it. It keeps all of my voicemails, SMS, and sent and received call history online.

Back 'er up
Bad things happen. If you aren't doing regular system-wide backups of your system, you absolutely should. Use Time Machine (on your Mac) or Carbon Copy Cloner to create restorable backups of your entire system. Some online-backup solutions are gaining popularity, but if  waiting for hundreds of gigabytes of photos and music to sync up with the server isn't your cup of tea, then you may want to stick to using an external hard drive for speed and ease. You can get a good 320GB external hard drive from your local Wal-Mart for around $80. It's very worth it. You don't want to lose those family pictures from last summer, do you?

Have some better ideas? Let me know in the comments.

If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away. - 2 Corinthians 5:17

Our Lord never nurses our prejudices, He mortifies them, runs clean athwart them. We imagine that God has a special interest in our particular prejudices; we are quite sure that God will never deal with us as He has to deal with other people. "God must deal with other people in a very stern way, but of course He knows that my prejudices are all right." We have to learn—"Not a bit of it!" Instead of god being on the side of our prejudices, He is deliberately wiping them out. It is part of our moral education to have our prejudices run straight across by His providence, and to watch how He does it. God pays no respect to anything we bring to Him. There is only one thing God wants of us, and that is our unconditional surrender.

When we are born again, the Holy Spirit begins to work His new creation in us, and there will come a time when there is not a bit of the old order left, the old solemnity goes, the old attitude to things goes, and "all things are of God." How are we going to get the life that has no lust, no self-interest, no sensitiveness to pokes, the love that is not provoked, that thinketh no evil, that is always kind? The only way is by allowing not a bit of the old life to be left; but only simple perfect trust in God, such trust that we no longer want God's blessings, but only want Himself. Have we come to the place where God can withdraw His blessings and it does not affect our trust in Him? When once we see God at work, we will never bother our heads about things that happen, because we are actually trusting in our Father in Heaven Whom the world cannot see.

- An excerpt from My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers

This is the will of God, even your sanctification. - 1 Thessalonians 4:3

It is not a question of whether God is willing to sanctify me; is it my will? Am I willing to let God do in me all that has been made possible by the Atonement? Am I willing to let Jesus be made sanctification to me, and to let the life of Jesus be manifested in my mortal flesh? Beware of saying—Oh, I am longing to be sanctified. You are not, stop longing and make it a matter of transaction—"Nothing in my hands I bring." Receive Jesus Christ to be made sanctification to you in implicit faith, and the great marvel of the Atonement of Jesus will be made real in you. All that Jesus made possible is made mine by the free loving gift of God on the ground of what He performed, my attitude as a saved and sanctified soul is that of profound humble holiness (there is no such thing as proud holiness, a holiness based on agonizing repentance and a sense of unspeakable shame and degradation; and also on the amazing realization that the love of God commended itself to me in that while I cared nothing about Him, He completed everything for my salvation and sanctification (see Rom. 5:8, RV). No wonder Paul says nothing is "able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Sanctification makes me one with Jesus Christ, and in Him one with God, and it is done only through the superb Atonement of Christ. Never put the effect as the cause. The effect in me is obedience and service and prayer, and is the outcome of speechless thanks and adoration for the marvelous sanctification wrought out in me because of the Atonement.

- An excerpt from My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers