commit eebf34c57607061759c8d25b28e4f4aa03481149
parent 5d16ba06068e9ba821529a9dc76347a333015d88
Author: Eamon Caddigan <eamon.caddigan@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 17 Feb 2025 21:03:19 -0800
Add weeknote for 2025-W08
Diffstat:
1 file changed, 55 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
diff --git a/content/posts/weeknotes/2025-w08/index.md b/content/posts/weeknotes/2025-w08/index.md
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+---
+title: "Weeknote for 2025-W08"
+description: "Astroterm, environmental impact of NumPy, fed news"
+date: 2025-02-17T20:57:55-08:00
+draft: false
+categories:
+- Weeknotes
+---
+
+## Astroterm: a terminal-based star map
+
+I walk my dog after dark most evenings, and I enjoy the excuse to look at the
+sky and try to identify the planets and constellations I can. Sometimes I check
+my work when I get back inside by spinning up
+[Stellarium](http://stellarium.org/), a wonderful---but fairly
+heavyweight---open source planetarium. I learned about `astroterm` shortly
+after its recent 1.0.7 release, and I'm finding it to be a perfect lightweight
+alternative for this job. I haven't explored every option, but so far the
+prebuilt binary works flawlessly on my machines.
+
+[astroterm](https://github.com/da-luce/astroterm)
+
+## The environmental benefits of efficiency
+
+I haven't finished listening to this entire interview with Ralf Gommers of
+NumPy on the project's development, but this part jumped out at me and felt
+worth sharing:
+
+> I realized that by shaving off even one megabyte from a NumPy binary, we
+> could save the equivalent of 200 intercontinental flights per year in terms
+> of data transfer.
+
+Wow! Thanks Ralf (and NumPy's other contributors) for caring.
+
+[Lessons Learned from NumPy’s
+Journey](https://quansight.com/post/lessons-learned-from-numpys-journey/)
+
+## What's new in the federal government
+
+I personally don't know many people affected by the recent firing of (nearly?)
+all probationary employees under the Department of Health and Human
+Services---a silver lining to the recent hiring freeze, I suppose. Based on
+what I've seen online, it looks like the _email_ that was sent _over the
+weekend_ firing my federal colleagues spuriously claimed that every recipient's
+"knowledge and skills do not fit [their Agencies'] current needs".
+
+I doubt any such people would read my website, or trust my judgment on these
+matters, but I believe that there exist some folks who credulously accept that
+Trump and Musk are firing all these people to make the federal workforce more
+"efficient". However, it is my **personal opinion** that these moves are
+costing agencies the very people with the knowledge and skills that our
+government needs the most. This will cost all of us.
+
+[HHS is losing thousands of workers under Trump administration probationary job
+cuts](https://apnews.com/article/trump-job-cuts-health-cdc-0d002fd6f528a7b91ced79628bf68196)
