Dan Q

I'm Dan Q (he/him). I've spent the last 26+ years creating and writing online.

I work as a software engineer, and I volunteer with Three Rings. I live with my partner, her husband, two kids and a dog. I can sometimes be found geo*ing, performing magic, or recording the most pointless podcast.

I believe in open source, open relationships, and opening doors to marginalised groups. Black lives matter. Trans rights are human rights.
Be nice to humans, human.

Photograph of Dan, his ponytail hanging over the shoulder of his black t-shirt, smiling from behind his beard and waving to the camera.

  • DOCTYPE

    I received my copy of DOCTYPE magazine, a genuine 'type this program in and run it'-style programming magazine but for a modern world, and enjoyed writing, debugging, playing, and then considering refining Stuart Langridge's puzzle The Nine Pyramids. Read more →

  • Pushing RSS to WhatsApp (for free?)

    RSS remains the gold standard for subscribing to Web content... but WhatsApp Channels/Newsletters provide another interesting opportunity for syndication. If only somebody had written an RSS-to-WhatApp integration that could run for free in a GitHub Action? Oh wait, that's what I just did! Read more →

  • Postcards... from the Internet!

    A few weeks ago I published a PO Box address to which visitors to my site can post postcards, to try to bridge the gap between my 'Internet friends' and the physical world. Today I received my first two postcards, and I couldn't be more thrilled (not least because I wasn't entire sure anybody would go for my weird suggestion!). Read more →

  • I guess I'm never paying DreamHost back

    About 17 years ago, I stopped using DreamHost. They later decided I owed them money. I disagreed, but enjoyed watching them incredibly-slowly claw it back via the 'refer and earn' program, from all the people I ever recommended them to. But now, only a few months from the (alleged) debt being settled... they've killed the program, depriving me of the opportunity for... a more-humorous blog post, I guess? Read more →

  • Beige Buttons

    When was the last time you saw a computer with a reset AND a turbo button? Bet it's been a while. But now, thanks to a stupid web component I made, you can see one on my website... or your own. What does it do? Nobody knows! Read more →

  • How I Learned the Pythagorean Theorem

    I clearly remember the day I first learned the Pythagorean theorem, because I had a problem I wanted to solve and a practical application that I wanted to use it on. Let's re-create the experience, and see if I can take any lessons about how to support my kids in their own mathematical journeys. Read more →

  • Are you closer to Ireland or Scotland?

    A throwaway comment in a WhatsApp group lead me to a deep dive into geodata encoding and drawing a big old line all the way across England (and a little way across Wales!). It's nerdsnipe time! Read more →

  • Send Me a Postcard!

    Sure, you could leave a comment or drop me an email or say hi on Mastodon... but wouldn't it be cooler if you could send a physical postcard in response to a blog post? Let's find out together. Read more →

  • The Signal and the Noise is still excellent

    13 years ago I reviewed The Signal and the Noise by Pagan Wanderer Lu. Despite being knocked down at least one peg, it still stands among my top ten concept albums ever, and it's now available for free so you should go and listen to it. Read more →

  • More articles →
    (articles are traditional long-form blog posts)

  • Can it perhaps be time that we stop saying "ethical non-monogamy"?

    Nobody feels the need to say "ethical monogamy"; monogamous folks are given the benefit of the doubt and assumed to be practicing a relationship ethically.

    I feel like polyamory, open relationships, relationship anarchy and other forms of non-monogamy are now sufficiently accessible to popular culture that we can drop the word "ethical" and still be understood. (Ideally we do so before it starts to look like virtue-labelling.)

  • Post: The perils of doors in gamedev

    Tom Forsyth recollects a bug that made Half-Life 2 unwinnable when built using a compiler to that supported SSE. A reminder of how weird the edge-cases in tech can be! Read more →

  • Post: Male Surname?

    This form dynamically changes the labels for the Surname and Forename field based on the value of the Gender field. Wut?

    Because a Male Surname is totally distinct and nothing like a Female Surname, I guess?!? Read more →

  • SVGs that feel like GIFs

    Back in July Vincent D. Warmerdam shared a great tip on screen-recording terminals into small, scalable animated SVG files, and I only just got around to reading it. Amazing stuff! Read more →

  • Happy Polyamory Day y’all. (Plus max props to Petra without whom I’d have forgotten about it, like most years.)Closest thing I did to celebrating it was going out to the pub last night for beer and food with my metamour, while our partner-in-common took our kids to see a film. Polyfam life isn’t always glamorous; […] Read more →

  • AI and cigarettes

    Chris Ferdinandi draws parallels between people pushing 'less-harmful' AI and those promoting vaping as 'less-harmful' smoking; the latter, of course, ultimately resulted in new people taking up a nicotine habit that might now have otherwise: not what was intended at all! Read more →

  • Post: 30 Years Of Notices

    This telegraph pole in the centre of Eynsham carries the scars of hosting countless community announcements, notices, and flyers over the last 30 years.× Read more →

  • Post: Autumn Sunrise

    Gorgeous autumn dawn this morning with a razor-sharp moon hanging above the shifting hues of the South-East. It’s going to be a cold one. (At last; it’s been an unseasonably-warm November so far!) × Read more →

  • Wrote note for GC88ZY9 The Devil's Quoits

    A local landowner has (controversially) decided to start enforcing their ownership of the land surrounding the lake at Dix Pit, and has erected new fences and private property signs to deter trespassers. So this evening, the geopup and I took a walk to the GZ to check that it's still an achievable find. Read more →

  • We Need to Talk About Botsplaining

    In a wonderful blog post from last month, Stephanie describes the scourge of Botsplaining. Here's my experience of it. Read more →

  • I really liked Only Murders in the Building. It started with a fun premise. It grew into something hilariously self-aware. I'd recommend it.

    But man, the fifth season had the most-disappointing reveal/conclusion imaginable.

    Hoping the promised sixth season does better.

  • Two modes of Internet use

    Tracy Durnell keeps her online- and offline- friends separate, and describes some solid reasons to do so. I appreciate her thoughts, even where I don't want to apply her conclusions to my own life. Read more →

  • The Piss Saga

    When somebody started repeatedly leaving bottles of urine on top of a utility cabinet in his neighbourhood, filmmaker Derek Milton decided to investigate. I watched the documentary he made while doing so and... I still have no idea what to think about it. Read more →

  • A chat with 19-year-old me

    Giles Turnbull's written a wonderful piece, imagining a conversation with his 19-year-old self. I wonder what I'd say to myself at 19 if I bumped into him? Read more →

  • Found GCAJJP3 Kohtauspaikat - Virtual Reward 4.0

    The younger child and I nipped across for a photo while we waited for our tram to come. Read more →

  • More posts →
    (of all kinds: articles, checkins, notes, reposts...)