macOS Time Machine exclusions can be managed via the terminal, as documented in Exclude folders by regex (?) from time machine backup, Control Time Machine from the command line, and Scripting Timemachine exclusion lists:

find `pwd` -maxdepth 3 -type d -name 'node_modules' | xargs -n 1 tmutil addexclusion

But this doesn’t make it show up in the System Preferences GUI. Writing to defaults seems to do that:

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist SkipPaths -array-add "~/.cache"

but I’m too paranoid about doing it wrong to see what happens.

Asimov is another option (installed via homebrew) to “Automatically exclude development dependencies from Apple Time Machine backups”.

Instead of ‘proving someone wrong’, why not help improve their capacities?

Web Skills

A visual overview of useful skills to learn as a web developer.

Reminds me of the trees from DuoLingo.

About Feeds

[Getting started guide to RSS.]

About Ideas Now

Find people to talk to or collaborate with by searching across the /about, /ideas and /now pages of 6692 personal websites.

Support Kottke.org With a Membership

About 45% of those who have been a member of kottke.org are currently not active paying members. That’s a lot of churn! If even half of those folks would re-up, I could do some additional cool shit around here, I think. That said, the number of active members has remained relatively steady over time, which I’m thankful for.

32-Bit Cafe

You’ve just made a website, but now you’re unsure where to go from here. Here are some ideas for things to add and techniques to learn.

How Bear does analytics with CSS

when a person hovers their cursor over the page (or scrolls on mobile) it triggers body:hover which calls the URL for the post hit. I don’t think any bots hover and instead just use JS to interact with the page, so I can, with reasonable certainty, assume that this is a human reader.

RsS iS dEaD LOL

Nice way to discover RSS feeds from your fediverse friends and neighbours.

How to make the most of the garlic you buy from the store!

[Feed soil with dry garlic skins.]

Anti-JavaScript could be called “antija”.

Purism kills pluralism.

for the chronic criticizers

[When someone always criticizes you: 1) ask if was meant for you or if they just wanted to hear it out loud; 2) ask “how am I supposed to do that?” to tease out whether they have actually thought about it practically; and 3) confirm that “what I’m hearing is…” to clarify if there’s anything constructive.]

Add one and a half times as much white vinegar as water to a pot and bring it to a boil. For every four cups of liquid, add a quarter cup salt and a quarter cup raw sugar, and simmer until they dissolve. Or don’t measure anything and add salt and sugar until the brine tastes like you want the vegetable you’ve preserved in it to: potent, salty, and just barely sweet.

Pickle brine is also the best place, other than cocktails, to put leftover brine from jars of capers and other pickles. If you have any, either add them to your own brine, or simply heat them all together, taste them, then add salt or sugar or water or straight vinegar until it tastes good.

[Serve your guests something that is best cooked in advance so you can spend more time with them instead of scrambling in another room.]

[Let guests pick herbs or slice bread instead of bringing salad, so that you can offer a meal as well as receive help and turn the kitchen into a collaborative space.]

All you need is links

A hyperlink is a triple where the subject is the page, the predicate is the link text, and the object is the thing being linked to.

Using the object name as link text could be wasteful.

Subtext explorations on Hashtags

Collecting into tagged buckets is not sense-making, only a coarse-grained first approximation. Sense-making should fold into Orientation, and make it possible to expand your repertoire of Actions. That means synthesizing collected information into new knowledge. This is something linking supports, and tags do not.

Let’s talk about what an iconic photo can tell us about Border Patrol….

Fixed fortifications are a monument to the stupidity of man.

It’s easier to trick people when they’re socially isolated, especially from one another.

NearbyWiki

Wikipedia places nearby you on a map.

[Add garlic to warm oil in a pan, immediately salt a little, and cook it piled in one corner to draw water and steam softly.]

[Add olive oil or butter whether the recipe calls for it or not.]

[Potato in soup pr sauce can absorb salt.]