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Publishing rhythm
Jun 2026 | 4 posts

Make the easy things easy

It’s so easy to get out of rhythm, get busy, and drop the ball on some things that you really want to do or should do. This blog is a good example. I took some time off for some family reasons, but have taken a long time to get back to it simply because I am out of rhythm. As I am trying to get back into the rhythm there is some tooling that I have set up for it that I completely forgot about that feel good to use again. Repetitive Tasks # [1] Simple Repetitive Tasks that I have to do often can just feel soul crushing, and one main thing that got me interested in programming. AI tools are becoming more and more useful at solving these problems. For instance code generation tools like co-pilot or codeium are really good at boilerplate and pattern repetition. Things that used to be a few vim macros is now just banging on tab. I often look for setting up templates or some sort of snippet to replace a big chunk of boilerplate that I know I will need over and over. timebox # [2] Do...

Underground Bases with Wyatt

Playing minecraft with Wyatt today he started a server all on his own and had me join. All vanilla, only one rule, underground bases. [1] I spawned into the server and it was already night time. I gathered up some wood on my way down a tree, and was attacked by zombies before I could get any tools, so I ran up another tree and crafted a crafting table. [2] Now to follow the rules, it’s time to head underground to build my base. [3] I made a mistake and died, but look at this view from my respawn point. [4] References: [1]: https://dropper.waylonwalker.com/api/file/eb43e707-ae55-48f8-9916-86321b3b8754.webp [2]: https://dropper.waylonwalker.com/api/file/25a3493a-f08b-4ea8-8535-b03cc7bcbf00.webp [3]: https://dropper.waylonwalker.com/api/file/74fc59aa-f0da-4643-a67a-36dc65480760.webp [4]: https://dropper.waylonwalker.com/api/file/7e852358-a680-460b-88c0-ed31b2a18501.webp

I took a break

Life comes in waves, and sometimes you need to set down some of your projects to focus on others. For the first part of 2023 I’ve really had a lot of family stuff to focus on, we also are pretty new homeowners and are still trying to get our new to us house cleaned up and modernized. Side Projects # [1] You can see in my growing list of repos [2] that I have poked around on quite a few side projects over the past few months. This has been quite relaxng to me, mostly things that I use to learn from, but also a lot that are tools and things I use that bring me joy. Pydantic # [3] I haven’t wrote about it at all yet, but I have really been starting to lean into pydantic on all of these side projects. I have really been enjoying the type system. A good friend @pypeaday [4] got me hooked and we have been throwing around this phrase that he learned from a math professor “Make it So”. The idea boils down to leveraging pydantic to make all the values you want to exist up front, or fail ...

Playing Star Wars Text Adventure with a 10 yr old

article.blog-post { max-width: 1200px; } The following is a playthrough of Star Wars Text Adventure with a 10 yr old.The following is a playthrough of StarThe following is a playthrough of Star ❯ sw-adventure game run [05/15/23 18:47:42] INFO marvin.marvin: Using OpenAI model "gpt-3.5-turbo" logging.py:50 18:47:42.699 | INFO | marvin.marvin - [default on default]Using OpenAI model "gpt-3.5-turbo"[/] [18:47:42] Starting game game.py:30 generating your character ╭─ Zorin Kreez's Mission Card ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │ Zorin Kreez │ Zorin Kreez was born on Tatooine and grew up in a small farming community. He │ │ health │ 100 │ always dreamed of adventure and excitement. As soon as he was old enough, he │ │ imperial credits │ 5000 │ joined the Imperial Navy and quickly rose through the ranks. He is now a skilled │ │ fuel level │ 100 │ pilot and loyal member of the Empire. │ │ │ │ │ Imperial │ A nimble and deadly starfight...
1 min read

Pydantic and singledispatch

I was reading about pydantic-singledispatch [1] from Giddeon’s blog and found it very intersting. I’m getting ready to implement pydantic on my static site generator markata [2], and I think there are so uses for this idea, so I want to try it out. The Idea # [3] Let’s set up some pydantic settings. We will need separate Models for each environment that we want to support for this to work. The whole idea is to use functools.singledispatch and type hints to provide unique execution for each environment. We might want something like a path_prefix in prod for environments like GithubPages that deploy to /<name-of-repo> while keeping the root at / in dev. Settings Model # [4] Here is our model for our settings. We will create a CommonSettings model that will be used by all environments. We will also create a DevSettings model that will be used in dev and ProdSettings that will be used in prod. We will use env as the discriminator so pydantic knows which model to use. from typing im...
2 min read

minecraft documentary

This is my first time journaling a Minecraft hardcore world, my son Wyatt is also documenting his journey in a survival world on wyattbubbylee.com [1]. Day 0 # [2] init [3] I logged into a brand new hardcore world. I was welcomed by a great Acacia biome spawn full of resources. I quickly cut my first tree, crafted an axe and set out to find my first sheep. I was able to find enough sheep for a bed, several cows and pigs. I crafted a set of wooden tools, and farmed out a wheat farm till my wooden hoed died at the shore of a nearby stream. I found a small stone outcropping in the side of a hill and harvested nearly a full stack of cobblestone from my first wooden pick. I ended the first day by sleeping in my bed safe from mobs. Achievements # [4] - bed - furnace - stone - wheat farm Day 1 # [5] [6] Thoughout the course of day one I collected wood and started the framework for my new house. Day 2 # [7] [8] The sun sets over the new frame of my house on Day 1 Day two...

Packages I Maintain

Markata # [1] I open sourced the static site framework that I use to build my-blog [2] among other side projects. It’s a plugins all the way down static site generator, that makes me happy to use. {% gh_repo_list_topic “waylonwalker”, “markata” %} Repos used to build this blog # [3] my-blog [2] is built on a number of small repos. I set it up this way so that creating content is fast and easy to do. I don’t have to worry about carrying around large images with my lightweight text files just to make some posts. {% gh_repo_list_topic “waylonwalker”, “personal-website” %} Kedro # [4] I am a heavy user of the kedro [5] framework, and a big advocate for using some sort of DAG framework for your data pipelines. kedro is built all in python which makes it easy for a python dev like me to extend, run, maintain, and deploy. {% gh_repo_list_topic “waylonwalker”, “kedro” %} Neovim Plugins # [6] I use vim for all of my text editing needs. It brings me joy to make any part of it just a...

I was on Talk Python

After years of listening to talkpython.fm [1] I had the honor to be part of episode-337 [2] to talk about Kedro for maintainable data science. I was quite nervous to talk on a show that I helped shape my career in such a profound way. I started my journey towards software engineering near Michaels first few episodes. His discussions with such great developers over the years has made an huge impact on my skill. It has always given me great advice and topics to go deeper on. During the episode I tried my best to let Yetu and Ivan take the spotlight as the maintainer and chime in with my experience as a user of kedro. Video Version # [3] https://youtu.be/WTcjvwkXoY0 Michael made the call available on youtube as well as the audio only podcast [2] References: [1]: https://talkpython.fm/ [2]: https://talkpython.fm/episodes/show/337/kedro-for-maintainable-data-science [3]: #video-version
1 min read

The one reason I switched to arch

The community, that’s it, end of post, roll the credits. I’m a tinkerer # [1] I am a tinkerer, I am not going to run a stock desktop manager, mostly becuase that’s just not how my brain works. I need to tweak everything to fit my needs. Grantid I have not spent much time in many full fledged linux desktop environments. They are far more customizable than windows ever will be, I absolutely love that about them. Inevitibly I end up in a situation where I hit a wall, it just won’t do what I want it to do, or my lack of understanding what came wtih it holds me back. minimal # [2] I love minimal installs. I love just building up my system from the bottom up with things that I like, I understand, and that I can script. I’m a noob # [3] I spend a lot of my time in the terminal. I’d like to think I know how to use a linux command line for software development really well, but there are a lot of things that I still dont know all that well, mostly because I don’t need to. The AUR # [5]...

LIVE-REPLAY - Python dev | Markata todoui | 4/6/2022

https://youtu.be/-42A5210HYo Super fun steam Broadcasted live on Twitch – Watch live at https://www.twitch.tv/waylonwalker We worked on markata todoui, a command tui trello board written in python using only markdown files to store the data. I love markdown and I want to make this my workflow. During this stream we get RAIDED by TEEJ_DV! and chat about tmux a bit before calling the changes to markata-tui good and signing off. - dotfiles: https://github.com/WaylonWalker/devtainer - today’s project: https://github.com/WaylonWalker/markata-todoui - website: https://waylonwalker.com/

How I Quickly Capture Screenshots directly into My Blog

When I am creating blog posts it’s often helpful to add screenshots to them to illustrate what I see on my screen. Sometimes I lack good screenshots in my posts because it just takes more effort than I have in the moment, and I prioritize making content over making perfect content. Making Screenshots # [1] When I have something to take a screenshot of, I need to take the shot, optimize the image, often convert it to a better format, publish it, and create a the img tag in my blog. - take screenshot - optimize - conversion - publish - create img tag Created in 🐍Python # [2] I created this tool for myself in python because that is what I am most familiar with, but realistically most of what I am calling are shell scripts that I could do in just about any language. Install my screenshot tool # [3] My screenshot tool is quite hacky and not configurable, but works wonderfully for me. If you like it and want to use it, make it configurable or fork it. For now it lives on GitHub...
3 min read

Copier < 6.0.0b0 considered dangerous

Copier is a fantastic templating library written in python, but older versions have a dangerous bug if you are using it inside of existing directories. !!UPDATE # [1] As of May 15, 2022, the stable release of copier now includes these changes, if you have not already make sure you update. This is a PSA # [2] I Use copier several times per day and get fantastic benefit from this project, this post is not intended to crap all over copier in any way, but is rather a PSA for other users who do use copier like I do so that they know the dangers of using copier inside an existing directory. The issue # [3] The fix # [4] https://github.com/copier-org/copier/pull/273 As of the time of writing this version is still in beta, if you still want to use copier with existing directtories, I’d strongly encourage you to install the --pre release. pipx install copier --pip-args='--pre' confirm # [5] copier --version # copier 6.0.0b0 My update commit # [6] https://github.com/WaylonWalker/de...

PyOhio CFP's

Here are some CFP’s that I used for PyOhio 2022. https://pretalx.com/pyohio-2022/cfp Idea to blog post in minutes - Shorter # [1] Markata is a plugins all the way down static site generator, that covers all the things you need to go from markdown to a blog site out of the box. Since it’s plugins all the way down you can also rip out all the default plugins, and do something completely different with the lifecycle. Lets build a whole blog site in 5 minutes. Add Kedro to your Pandas Workflow - Short # [2] Sometimes python scripts/notebooks take a long time to run, let kedro automatically save your datasets so that you can maintain your production code with ease. Lets take a pipeline with an issue 30 minutes in and solve the issue in 5 mintues. References: [1]: #idea-to-blog-post-in-minutes---shorter [2]: #add-kedro-to-your-pandas-workflow---short

functools.total_ordering makes adding all of six of the rich comparison operators to your custom classes much easier, and more likely that you remember all of them.

From the Docs: The class must define one of __lt__(), __le__(), __gt__(), or __ge__ In addition, the class should supply an __eq__() method.

one of these

  • lt()
  • le()
  • gt()
  • ge()

and required to have this one

  • eq()

Total Ordering Docs

Here is an example using the Enum I was working on the other day.

from enum import Enum, auto
from functools import total_ordering


@total_ordering
class LifeCycle(Enum):

    configure = auto()
    glob = auto()
    load = auto()
    pre_render = auto()
    render = auto()
    post_render = auto()
    save = auto()

    def __lt__(self, other):
        try:
            return self.value < other.value
        except AttributeError:
            return self.value < other

    def __eq__(self, other):
        try:
            return self.value == other.value
        except AttributeError:
            return self.value == other

Smoother Python with automatic imports | pyflyby

This is not a flaky works half the time kind of plugin, it’s a seriously smooth editing experience. I’ve just started using pyflyby, and it is solid so far. I have automatic imports on every save of a python file in neovim, and automatic imports on every command in ipython. I can’t tell you how pumped I am for this, and how good its felt to use over the past few weeks. It’s glorious. YouTube video # [1] Listen to me rant on how great pyflyby is https://youtu.be/2QW5DJiEJH4 Give the video a watch, I did not have noise-cancelling on in obs. My apologies for the background hum and the mic stand bumps. I did my best to fix them up. Installation # [2] How to install pyflyby for automatic python imports pyflyby is hosted on pypi, so you can get it with pip. I have had no issues installing it on 3.8+ so far. pip install pyflyby Configuration setup with stow # [3] always stow your dotfiles If you’re going to configure any of your tools the first thing you should do is set it up w...

You must use augroup with autocmd in vim | Here's how

If you are running vim autocmd’s without a group, you’re killing your performance. Granted your probably not sourcing your vimscript files with autocmd’s too often, but every time you source that vimscript you are adding another command that needs to run redundantly. https://youtu.be/2ITTn4Dl0lc This is what I had # [1] Not silky smooth For WAAY too long I have had something like this in my vimrc or init.vim. It formats my python for me on every save, works great except if I source my dotfiles more than once I start adding how many times black runs. autocmd bufwritepre *.py execute 'Black' Why is a bare autocmd bad # [2] let me demonstrate Lets create a new file called format.vim and give it the :so %. Works great, it starts telling me that its formatting. autocmd bufwritepre *.py :echo("formatting with black") too-many-formats [3] BUT as every time I give it the :so % it formats an extra time on every single save. Setting up an augroup # [4] I’ve been told I need an aug...

Code Review from the comfort of vim | Diffurcate

I often review Pull requests from the browser as it just makes it so easy to see the diffs and navigate through them, but there comes a time when the diffs get really big and hard to follow. That’s when its time to bring in the comforts of vim. https://youtu.be/5NKaZFavM0E Plugins needed # [1] This all stems from the great plugin by AndrewRadev [2]. It breaks a down into a project. So rather than poping into a pager from git [3] diff, you can pipe to diffurcate and it will setup a project in a tmp directory for you and you can browse this project just like any other except it’s just a diff. Plug 'AndrewRadev/diffurcate.vim' My aliases # [4] First to quickly checkout PR’s from azure devops I have setup an alias to fuzzy select a pr and let the az command do the checkout. alias azcheckout='az repos pr checkout --id $(az repos pr list --output table | tail -n -2 | fzf | cut -d " " -f1)' Next I have a few aliases setup for checking diffs. The first one checks what is staged vs the...

Setup a yaml schema | yamlls for a silky smooth setup

I’ve gone far too long without a good setup for editing yaml files, I am missing out on autocomplete and proper diagnostics. This ends today as I setup yaml-language-server in neovim. https://youtu.be/xo4HrFoKF4c The video for this one is part of a challenge-playlist [1] I put out for myself to constantly improve my dotfiles for all of December. init.vim # [2] I have my init.vim setup to only source other modules, if you want everything in a single config, feel free to do as you wish. I broke mine up earlier this year as I doubled into nvim and am not going back. source ~/.config/nvim/plugins.vim lua require'waylonwalker.cmp' lua require'waylonwalker.lsp-config' Plugin setup # [3] You will need the following plugins. I use plug, if you don’t you will have to convert the syntax over to the plugin manager you use. neovim/nvim-lspconfig [4] is for configuring the lsp. It comes with a bunch of sane defaults for most servers, so you pretty much just have to call setup on that serv...

Open files FAST from zsh | or bash if thats your thing

https://youtu.be/PQw_is7rQSw I am often in a set of tmux splits flying back and forth, accidentally close my editor, so when I come back to that split and hit my keybinds to edit files I enter them into zsh rather than into nvim like I intended. Today I am going to sand off that rough edge and get as similar behavior to nvim as I can with a couple of aliases. Make sure you check out the YouTube video to see all of my improvements. what’s an alias # [1] If you have never heard of an alias before it’s essentially a shortcut to a given command. You can pass additional flags to the underlying command and they will get passed in. Most of the time they are just shorter versions of commands that you run often or even like in this case a common muscle memory typo that occurs for you. My new alias’s for fuzzy editing files from zsh # [2] Here are the new aliases that I came up with to smooth out my workflow. These give me a similar feel to how these keys work in neovim but from zsh. #...

How linux users install a text editor

In honor of the neovim 0.6.0 release, I decided to do a funny skit installing neovim, and fix up my install script in the process as part of my challenge to fix up my dotfiles. I ran into one snag where I was not updating the repo that I cloned. I moved it to the directory I now keep third-party git [1] repos and set it to update with ansible. https://youtu.be/64oKLphhBuo The thing that took me the longest to realize was…. I had a path issue pointing me to an old install of the appimage over the fresh build, fixed that up and now we are on 0.7.0 nightly. Related Links # [2] https://neovim.io/ https://github.com/neovim/neovim https://github.com/neovim/neovim/releases/tag/v0.6.0 References: [1]: /glossary/git/ [2]: #related-links