Around the month of March, I discovered LaTeX, the popular typesetting engine, and decided that in order to learn how to use it, I'd use it for all homework assignments until the end of the year. So I did, and to this day, all of my homework assignments since March 27th have been authored with LaTeX.
A little later than that, I stumbled upon git, the distributed version control system that's all the rage nowadays. Because it's decentralized, you can have a local repository that you can commit to and mess with on your home machine, and then push updates back up to the Internet if you have a main git repository somewhere.
So then it clicked. I'd use git and LaTeX together. git to manage revisions I've made to projects, so if I screwed something up, no big deal, I could restore from the previous revision. LaTeX would be used because git originally dealt with source code, and LaTeX documents are essentially macros. That would mean running diffs on revisions would be readable, unlike binary file formats like RTF or Word's .doc files.
A month ago, I signed up for github. This is what really makes it click for me.
github is a git repository host. They have a free plan (100MB max storage, more on that limitation later) and essentially everyone can have their projects hosted on a git repository. Not only is their website amazing, but pushing an update to github is as simple as typing 'git push origin master'.
And this simplicity is what will save your ass.
If you're a mildly braindead person like me who accidentally forgets to print a history project that's due after lunch, but you typed in that one command after committing, that .tex file (and in my case, .pdf file as well) is automatically available from anywhere in the world you can log into.
So you just have to find a working computer, log in, download the latest revision, print it, and you're safe.
Four words saved my ass. No needing to type in a complicated ftp URL or launch a new app or anything. Four words and a password equals an automatic backup and being able to access it from anywhere.
Miracle of the year.
Time for a short overview of what'll be going down in the next week:
I'll be in New York City from May 7-9th without my computer. That's right, I'll be off the grid and relying on my iPod touch for all forms of communication. How's that going to work?
If you want real-time status updates of what I'm up to: go to Twitter. I'll be unblocking my tweets for a limited time, but be warned: it's uncensored. Your initial reaction may vary, welcome to the Internet.
Any direct communication should be done via the following means in order:
- Twitter direct messages. This'll only work if you're on my contacts, but both my iPod Twitter clients do direct messages, so I'll be checking those a lot.
- Send me an IM on my mobile account. Those of you who want it will have to ask for it, if you're any good at guessing AIM screennames, you'll find it.
- Email at the usual address. If you don't know it, go to r-ch.net to find it.
