Projects and Updates, 2020-04-01

I was considering writing a section on the Google Home app and how it isn't fully functional on the Google Pixelbook or Google Pixel Slate. Instead, here is a one sentence review: If you sell stuff that supposedly all works together, you should make it all work together.

Playlist of music in this post: Spotify

Events App: Hiding Old Contacts

I created a quick way to get old contacts out of sight and out of mind when choosing attendees for an event: adding "Archive" to a contact's notes field and filtering away those results. It was a great way to leverage data I was already accessing... implementing the solution only took a single line of SQL:^[1]

            ' WHERE ' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_GLOBAL_NOTES + ' NOT LIKE \'%Archive%\' ' +

The entire statement looks like this:

    String tempSql =
        'SELECT ' +
            DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS + '.' + 'id' + DbS.COMMA_SEP +
            ' ' + DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS + '.' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_LAST_NAME + DbS.COMMA_SEP +
            ' ' + DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS + '.' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_FIRST_NAME + DbS.COMMA_SEP +
            ' ' + DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS + '.' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_GLOBAL_NOTES + DbS.COMMA_SEP +
            ' ' + tempInviteeTableName + '.' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_INVITEE_FOREIGN_KEY_CONTACT_TABLE +
            ' FROM ' + DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS +
            ' LEFT JOIN ' + tempInviteeTableName +
            ' ON ' + tempInviteeTableName + '.' +
            DbS.COLUMN_NAME_INVITEE_FOREIGN_KEY_CONTACT_TABLE +
            ' = ' + DbS.TABLE_NAME_CONTACTS + '.' + 'id' +
            ' WHERE ' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_GLOBAL_NOTES + ' NOT LIKE \'%Archive%\' ' + 
            ' ORDER BY case when ' + tempInviteeTableName + '.' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_INVITEE_FOREIGN_KEY_CONTACT_TABLE + ' then 2 ' +
            ' else 1 ' +
            ' end asc, ' + DbS.COLUMN_NAME_CONTACT_FIRST_NAME;

When a cup is 1/2 cup (Or 2/3rds)

Previously on CKDSN:

I have an idea: homemade hot chocolate in a coffee percolator. I'm not certain this idea will work, but that's okay because I have another idea that I think will work: mulled wine in a coffee percolator.

So it turns out a "12 cup" coffee percolator doesn't necessarily hold 96 ounces of liquid. In the coffee world, a "cup" is 4 to 6 ounces.

So, long story short (I don't have the strength to walk you through the details), that's the (partial) aftermath of my coffee percolator rocketing wine out of its spout.

As someone who neurotically attaches units to numbers^[2], I was wildly distressed to learn that a cup isn't always 8 ounces.^[3]

Bon Appétit vs NY Times Cooking

A friend of mine recently raved to me about Bon Appétit… so convincing was this rave that I went home and purchased a subscription to the magazine. (A Real Life Magazine Subscription!)

My expectations of my Bon Appétit experience:

• Online recipes, hopefully ad free? (Maybe a tasteful banner here and there?)
• A recipe box to save my favorites.

My actual Bon Appétit experience:

• Ads. Big obtrusive ads.
• Ads imploring me to subscribe to the magazine, even though I'm logged in as a subscriber.
• No recipe box.

In fairness: Condé Nast owns Bon Appétit, the magazine industry is not what it used to be, and if you're Condé Nast you probably create a single website template and use it everywhere.

So I get why it might make sense for Condé Nast, but that doesn't mean it makes sense for me; it's still a disappointing user experience. You know what does make sense for me? NY Times Cooking:

• No obtrusive ads. (Note: In the image above, you can see a sliver of a banner ad that will scroll away.)
• A recipe box! A recipe box that you can use to save recipes from other websites! A recipe box that I use to save recipes from... Bon Appétit.

Honestly, I only remembered NY Times Cooking existed because I was so disappointed with my first experience. I'm almost certainly one-year-and-done with Bon Appétit; long live NY Times Cooking.

Five Albums

• Once Again, John Legend
• Ouroboros, Ray LaMontagne
• Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic, Prince
• Tidal, Fiona Apple
• When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, Billie Eilish

Spotify playlist