For those of you not following the NBA too closely you might not be aware but tonight the Magic play the Heat. For about the past month or so the two teams have been battling out for the final seed in the Eastern Conference Playoffs. I'll re-cap why this is so important for the Magic since they're the team I support and maybe some Heat fans can hit back with a reply for why it's so important to them.

1. In the 2011-2012 season the Magic entered a dark period called the "Dwightmare" where their best player who had led them to an NBA final Dwight Howard began stirring up drama within the organisation. Dwight was traded in the offseason to the Lakers giving serious deja vu of Shaq's time in Orlando. Since 2012 the Magic have consistently been cursed to mediocrity and missing the playoffs.

2. Magic star Nikola Vucevic (a player acquired from the Dwight trade) has been constantly underrated and disrespected by people around the NBA. After 7 seasons Vuc has finally made the All Star team and has led this team to exceed the expectations set at the beginning of the season. It is also important to note that Vuc has not made the playoffs either since 2012 when he was playing with the 76ers.

3. The Magic are 0.5 games behind the Heat, whoever wins this match will take the 8th seed from the other and likely bring a lot of motivation and momentum into their next games therefore being more likely to make the playoffs.

There's many more storylines to this match than I've put in here but I feel that this gets the main gist of why it's so important to fans of the Magic.

What are you reading currently? Fiction or non-fiction, any genre, any language! Tell us what you're reading, and talk a bit about it.

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I am currently enjoying a very thought-provoking semester of American Literature. Prior to this class, I wouldn't have considered fiction as useful in my everyday life, as opposed to something like a self-help book. What I've found is exactly the opposite, and I have found novels such as Great Expectations to be even more influential than anything I've ever read.

So I ask you all, what is the greatest lesson you've learned from classical fiction?

I was fed up with the chores of writing consistent git commit messages, so a while ago I started developing a hook in Emacs which I used with Magit (actually git-commit-mode) which uses some crude heuristics to fill out the COMMIT_EDITMSG buffer for me. Here is what it does (| stands for the cursor):

• If only a single file modified, insert <filename>: |

  • If can figure out function name, insert <filename> (<functionname>): |

• If only a single file added, insert Add <filename>|

• If a TODO added to Readme.org, insert ; TODO <headline>|

• If a TODO was DONE, insert ; DONE <headline>|

• If the files are Readme.org and Readme.org_archive, and no new TODO's were added anywhere, insert ; Archive DONE|

• If the file is .gitignore, insert ; Ignore |

• If the file is TAGS, insert ; Update TAGS|

I extend this when I find new cases where I repeatedly do the same thing. The code is below. It's probably a good idea to use it as a starting point and personalise it because this reflects how I like to write my commit messages (and I like pretending how they do it over at Emacs git repo). It is sloppy and probably buggy, but I don't think it can be destructive.

Final note: I can't figure out how to set this up so that after this takes effect, the buffer is marked as modified. I want to flip the modified bit so that in some cases I can just hit C-c C-c and go. But I need to modify the buffer somehow to commit in some cases (I just type C-o to open a new line in those cases). Here is the function:

(defun gk-git-commit-mode-hook ()
  "Set up git commit buffer."
  ;; If a single file is modified, prefix the message w/ it.
  (let ((modified-re "^#	modified:")
        (new-re "^#	new file:")
        (issue-re "^[+\\- ]\\*+ \\(TODO\\|DONE\\) ")
        current-defun filename addp onlyp issuep)
    (save-excursion
      (with-current-buffer "COMMIT_EDITMSG"
        (goto-char (point-min))
        (re-search-forward "^# Changes to be committed:" nil t)
        (forward-line)
        (beginning-of-line)
        (cond ((looking-at modified-re)
               (re-search-forward ":   " nil t)
               (setf filename (thing-at-point 'filename t)))
              ((looking-at new-re)
               (re-search-forward ":   " nil t)
               (setf filename (thing-at-point 'filename t)
                     addp t)))
        (setq onlyp (progn
                      (forward-line)
                      (not (or (looking-at modified-re)
                               (looking-at new-re)))))
        (when (and onlyp (equal filename "Readme.org"))
          (goto-char (point-min))
          (when-let* ((pos (re-search-forward issue-re nil t)))
            (setq issuep (progn
                           (re-search-backward "\\*" nil t)
                           (buffer-substring (1+ (point))
                                             (line-end-position))))))
        ;; Try to set ‘current-defun’.
        (when onlyp
          (save-excursion
            (goto-char (point-min))
            ;; Error if not found, means verbose diffs
            ;; not enabled.
            (re-search-forward "^diff --git")
            (goto-char (line-beginning-position))
            (let ((str (buffer-substring (point) (point-max)))
                  (default-directory (expand-file-name "..")))
              (with-temp-buffer
                (insert str)
                (diff-mode)
                (goto-char (point-min))
                (setq current-defun (diff-current-defun))))))))
    (if onlyp
        (cond
         ((and issuep (not addp))
          (goto-char (point-min))
          (insert ";" issuep))
         ((equal filename "TAGS")
          (goto-char (point-min))
          (insert "; Update TAGS"))
         ((equal filename ".gitignore")
          (goto-char (point-min))
          (insert "; Ignore "))
         (filename
          (goto-char (point-min))
          (if addp
              (insert "Add " filename)
            (insert
             filename
             (if (and current-defun)
                 (format " (%s)" current-defun)
               "")
             ": "))))
      (when (and (equal filename "Readme.org")
                 (save-excursion
                   (goto-char (point-min))
                   (re-search-forward (concat modified-re " +Readme.org_archive")
                                      nil t))
                 (save-excursion
                   (goto-char (point-min))
                   (re-search-forward "\\-\\*+ DONE" nil t))
                 (not
                  (save-excursion
                    (goto-char (point-min))
                    (re-search-forward "\\+\\*[\\+\\-] TODO" nil t))))
        (goto-char (point-min))
        (insert "; Archive DONE")))))

(add-hook 'git-commit-mode-hook #'gk-git-commit-mode-hook)

Hope you find it useful.

In 2016, I was an ardent supporter of Bernie. But come the general, I voted 3rd party, because I was "Bernie or Bust." Many people accuse me of indirectly voting for Trump, allowing "the worst thing ever" to happen (esp since I'm in a swing state that went Trump). But here's the truth as I see it: Voting Democrat regardless of candidate, with their only qualification being "Not Trump," will only increase the USA's slide (deeper) into fascism.

The reality I see is that even if Trump had never entered the 2016 race, 90%+ of the policy, judicial appointments, and everything else that he has done since being elected would be identical no matter which "R" candidate won the race, because all of these things are exactly what the GOP has been doing for decades. In that regard, I consider Trump more favorable than any other R candidate, because he is at least failing to do his "real" job: Hiding fascist, imperialist policy behind a charismatic smile and some clever words.

Ultimately, this is the reason why I don't generally support Democrats either. Hillary's policy wouldn't have been as immediately destructive as the GOP agenda, but it also would not have stopped the march towards fascism. I voted my conscious in 2016, and will do so again in 2020. I just hope there are more people willing to do the same this time around.

I like to picture that the government of the USA is digging a hole. With every shovelful, we're sliding ever closer to a fully authoritarian fascist regime, and the destruction of our planet. While Trump (and the GOP as a whole) has been calling in for backhoes and drills to speed the process....as far as I can tell, only two candidates in the 2020 primary are calling to stop the digging: Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. At best, the other candidates are conveying messages akin to: "We need to compromise with the GOP and maybe slow down the rate at which we allow new backhoes to be brought to the pit."

In my mind then, it makes more sense for 4 more years of Trump, than to allow another center-right candidate for his opposition. Because at least Trump isn't able to pull off the charismatic smile and/or intelligent language that the Regan's, Bush's, Clinton's, and Obama's of the world have that allow terrible things to continue behind a cloak of "incremental change." It wakes up those who would otherwise tolerate these horrendous acts, and perhaps inspires them to become more active. By allowing for the political discourse to end with "Anything is better than Trump", it just permits the overall platform to gradually, but continually shift to the right.

And in my mind, it is the total death of real, dissenting voices in public discourse that is far, far worse than Trump winning another term could ever be.

I would love to hear if anybody else in this community has had feelings akin to what I've described here, as I've only been described as "insane" by most of the people I've discussed this with in person.

Hello !

I've been interested in reading some works from famous Beat Generation authors like Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Carolyn Cassady, Allan Ginsberg, etc.

I have yet to read any of their works but I'm not quite sure where to start. I've been thinking of 'On the Road' by Kerouac but the reviews I've been reading have been mixed. It doesn't seem like it's for everybody, especially considering the writing style. I've also been thinking of 'The Dharma Bums', also by Kerouac since it seems to be more spiritual, which is something that really resonates with me.

Anyway, if you have any recommendations/opinions I'd be more than happy to hear them. Thanks !!!