Plurrrr

The trillions of bacteria in and on our bodies can bolster our health and contribute to disease, but just which microbes are the key actors has been elusive. Now, a study involving thousands of people in Finland has identified a potential microbial culprit in some cases of depression.

The finding, which emerged from a study of how genetics and diet affect the microbiome, “is really solid proof that this association could have major clinical importance,” says Jack Gilbert, a microbial ecologist at the University of California, San Diego, who was not involved with the work.

As software developers, we’ve all come across those annoying, not-so-useful error messages when using some library or framework: "Couldn’t parse config file", "Lacking permission for this operation", etc. Ok, ok, so something went wrong apparently; but what exactly? What config file? Which permissions? And what should you do about it? Error messages lacking this kind of information quickly create a feeling of frustration and helplessness.

So what makes a good error message then? To me, it boils down to three pieces of information which should be conveyed by an error message:

• Context: What led to the error? What was the code trying to do when it failed?
• The error itself: What exactly failed?
• Mitigation: What needs to be done in order to overcome the error?

I had a dream

• A low power, always-on computer I could SSH into from any other computer in the house.
• All of my projects and data in Git repos available for cloning and updating from any computer in the house.
• My personal Linux/UNIX configuration ("dotfiles") available to any computer in the house for instant and granular installation.
• No dependencies on any computer outside my home network.