This article mentions "writing by hand" but I've gotten a lot of value out of using project specific markdown files for keeping track of project info, logging discussions and decisions, and generally keeping a small knowledge base. These have been wildly useful for remembering small details and project histories, and if you sync them between devices, you always have access to your project notes!

Just in case, I have to share this great explanation of the term "everything is a file": https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/141016/a-laymans-explanation-for-everything-is-a-file-what-differs-from-windows#141020

This really helped clear things up for me, the main idea is that everything is represented by the filesystem, so you can use the same file-manipulation tools on a ton of systems.

due to the system’s large-capacity, low-performance storage structure, no external backups were maintained

Oh man, thats terrifying. Critical systems running without a backup

This is wonderful! I'll have to look back through the last 35 years

I can speak to the value of a community fridge, I've been helping pick up food donations once a week for the past few years. Our town has a few locations downtown and a small network of people manage them (I'm only there to help with heavy boxes). The fridges are all posted outside of churches, which provide electricity and extra storage space, and it's mostly retired folk who handle the logistics. Whenever we run into someone who's there to pick up food, they're always so thankful (if they want to talk, some people aren't comfortable interacting). We often hear of medical issues putting people out of work, families having to take in kids from other places, and all manner of difficult situations.

Here's a short impact assessment from 2019 with some numbers (not my town). But these places end up having hosts of network affects that benefit their communities.

Oh fun! 3 groups writing essays over 3 sessions, llm assisted, search assisted, or raw brainpower. Generally the llm assisted group had more accurate essays, but were less cognitively engaged and couldn't remember their own writing. All the stuff I think one would expect, but the NLP section went way over my head.

Ohhhh I like the step by step compiler build, could be a good time! I've always wondered what makes a lisp a "lisp", this would probably elucidate that pretty fully.