Michael W. Lucas's Blog, page 3

80: Mentally Stable People

I’m gonna finish this book. I’m gonna finish this book. It doesn’t matter how much life tries to stop me, I’m gonna finish this book…

One of the great problems of civilization is disposing of unwanted stuff. Nuclear power means nuclear waste, which remains toxic for tens of millennia and grants superpowers only to untraumatized, mentally stable people, of which there are zero. The obvious solution, of course, is “put it in the trash and make someone else deal with it,” which is our society’s go-...

“SSH Mastery” now available in print direct from me

The headline kind of says it all, but it won’t let me put a link so I’ll repeat it. If you want SSH Mastery in print you can buy it from me. Unlike any other store, buy the print and you get the no-DRM ebook for free.

Thanks to the number of retail channels I use I have no ability to generate per-title book sales figures, but SSH Mastery is consistently near the top at most of the stores.

Print and ebook editions of all future Tilted Windmill Press titles will be available first through my store...

79: Creepy As Chad

The “Project IDGAF” Terminal Death March is upon me, so here’s a tidbit

You people in the special effects department need to pay attention here. Yeah, I know most of you are busy building the Isaac Asimov sign and rigging explosives in the faux gas station Props slammed together last night, not to mention stealing the mail collection box we need to complete the two blocks of Mole Hill we’ll need for the Big Finish. Yes, we’re on a tight timeline and a tighter budget. But this bit needs to be ge...

The Reader Acquisition Funnel

I keep referring people to the Reader Acquisition Funnel, which I wrote about in the middle of one of my monthly See the Sausage Being Made posts. It’s clear I need to pull this out into its own post. I’ve twiddled with the text because I can’t leave bad enough alone.

My goal is to spend my life doing work I enjoy. That means I’ve had to learn unholy business concepts that I would rather not soil my soul with, and apply them to my trade. Disintermediation is one of those concepts. I want you to ...

78: Parentally Mandated Assholes

I’m still grinding to get “project IDGAF” done by the end of the month, so here’s a snippet from it.

The average party has a handful of actual friends and a few people that think they’re friends. Not even the birthday girl knows who belongs in which category. High school friendships fail only in challenges like “Emily slacked off on the group project,” which is a pretty coarse filter compared to adulthood’s “every one of these bastards will betray me to steal my promotion.” Sociopaths succeed be...

Now available: combined print/ebook bundles direct from my bookstore

The question I get asked most often is “Can I get a print and ebook combo of your books?” No, hang on, that’s not quite true. Technically, the most common questions are “Are you mad?” followed by “Are you serious?” but the print/ebook combo thing is a solid third place.

I am delighted to announce that after years of work, I deploying direct print sales from my bookstore. Buy the print book and get the ebook free. Ebook will arrive in minutes. The print book will ship in about a week.

Only Run Y...

77: The Wrong Kind of Clever

The networking book is heavy in command line stuff, which I’m not going to read. Here’s another chunk of the fiction project.

The driver had a postgraduate degree in Not Being Noticed. The black suit and tie oozed boredom. His smoothly-shaved face lacked a big nose, round lips, a jutting chin, or any other distinguishing trait. His freshly trimmed black hair was combed to perfection, his tie snug despite the heat. Heavy black sunglasses protected his eyes from the scorching light. If he’d been s...

January’s Joggly Sausage

(This post went to Patronizers at the beginning of January, and the public at the beginning(ish) of February.)

My thoughts on last month? “Well, that was a thing that happened.” Lost two weeks to holiday chaos, but managed to get a few words made anyway.

The Dear Abyss Kickstarter is basically complete. Three people still owe me their addresses to ship books. That’s a problem, but I’ve poked them to fill out their backer surveys. When I get addresses, I’ll ship. My conscience is clean. I’m havin...

76: Freedom Costs Five Cents a Can

A chunk of the current fiction project.

The Barrens might be uninhabited, but people live near enough to hear when some damn fool gets their hands on dynamite and goes out for informal fireworks. The staties always ignored the first two calls, but when a third person called they’d dispatch someone to take a look. Not that they’d catch anyone. The officer might notice a blown-up boulder or two, with or without accompanying crushed beer cans. The deposit law’s nothing but government overreach afte...

75: Interrupt So Frequently

Here’s a chunk from the new Networking for System Administrators.

Here’s the catch. The listed speed is not how fast the interface can pass traffic. Think of the speed as a language. Your server’s NIC might speak and understand the 2.5G protocol, but that’s no guarantee that the server, card, or network can support passing that much traffic. Actual throughput depends on how the NIC is attached to the host’s bus, the network cable, the load on the switch, and more. Some low-quality NICs speak the...