Ascetic Computing

(Sketchbook drawing by the author, fountain pen.)

I recently came across a comment I’d written in a configuration file. It
was above some commented-out lines. It said:

# I opted to do without this for ascetic reasons.

I often put a fair amount of effort into perfecting and cleaning up
source and configuration files for aesthetic reasons, so this comment
briefly threw me for a loop. Then I chuckled. How droll.

The more I thought about it, thought, I had to conclude that I’ve been doing a
lot of things lately for "ascetic reasons".

As the asceticism article (wikipedia.org)
begins:

"Asceticism is a lifestyle characterized by abstinence from worldly pleasures
through self-discipline, self-imposed poverty, and simple living…​"

I acknowledge we moderns often give asceticism a religious and
spiritual flavor, but the term predates that use and
originates with regular old down-to-earth self improvement. (More on
that in the section Keeping Sharp below.)

Further, the brand of asceticism I’m thinking of is a "natural asceticism"
which results from a pursuit of simplicity and focus, not an asceticism of
suffering or denial for its own sake! I’m not picturing a starving monk in
a hair shirt, but something more like Henry David Thoreau in Walden: "I
went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately" a life
not "frittered away by detail."

(Hey, look at me, I’m the Thoreau of computing! Seriously, though, the
comparison is pretty apt because, like Thoreau, I haven’t strayed very far
from civilization and still make regular use of it. For what it’s worth, I
do laundry.)

What it means to me

I’ve come up with a list of principles that are the basis for my ascetic
computing.

Before I give you the list, understand that I mostly live by these
principles, but not always. Just search for "Faust" and "Faustian" on this
page.

Here’s what "ascetic computing" means to me:

Doing without things that compromise my personal standards or morals.

Learning to live Fearlessly in the face of Missing Out.

Resisting the Endless Pursuit of Shiny Things.

What’s interesting is that the word computer does not appear even once.
Someone 200 years ago probably would have understood my list, and could
comprehend, after a moment of pause, the modern idioms "Fear of
Missing Out" and "Shiny Things".

All three of these principles are challenging, but I think the Shiny Things are my
final boss. I’m one of those people who follows the links on Wikipedia and
finds themselves with 30 tabs open an hour later. Or who buys supplies for
hobbies with the full intention of doing that hobby for the rest of my life.
And then…​doesn’t.

(Yes, I used to learn a lot of subjects, but the problem with Shiny Things
is that when I was always chasing the new fashions in computing, I never
gave myself a chance to dive deeply into the things I really cared about.
Of course, you first have to figure out what you really care about, so I
think you probably should look at the Shiny Things when you’re starting
out. What is shiny now may become a well-worn old favorite a decade from
now.)

Anyway, I’d like to point out that deprivation is not on the list. A certain
amount of deprivation may occur as a result of following the three principles,
but it’s not the goal.

The goal is to live a (computing) life of principle, purpose, and focus.

(Sketchbook drawing by the author with black and gray liner pens.)

I’m not kidding, I really do enjoy computing like this

I have no desire to wander into the desert with a laptop computer and some
solar panels and starve myself until I go on a vision quest (though I do seek
the sort of simplicity that would entail).

It’s not that I’m not interested in new things, it’s just that I want to
concentrate on the things that are important to me with as few distractions as
possible. I wish for my natural state to be either a) learning,
creating things, and writing or b) resting.

Another way to look at it: Rather than deprivation, I see this as enjoying what
I have, which is a lot. See also
In Favor of Enjoying Things on Purpose (raptitude.com) by David Cain.

Finally, to be explicitly clear before we go any further, because some people
will insist on misreading this article: Nothing I do on computers is
masochistic self-denial or performative mortification to impress anyone.
Quite the opposite! I find my habits pleasurable and satisfying.

Nor has this been a sudden proclamation I just made one day. It’s simply a
natural mode into which I’ve settled at this stage of my life.

In short, I wouldn’t do it this way if I didn’t like it.

Simplicity and things that just work

I have adored the following Flaubert quote ever since I was introduced to it in a book chapter titled "Be Boring" by
Austin Kleon (austinkleon.com):

"Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work."

— Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880)

I’m at the point in my life where I’d rather spend my creative energy on
a project of my own creation than fighting my operating system and tools.

I’d rather do without a few conveniences if it means less complications
and breakages and distractions.

No distractions

For me, this means not using operating systems and software that presumes
it is entitled to use my computer to interrupt me
with messages and threats at all hours. My time and attention is in very
limited supply and very precious to me. Software that steals it is
abhorrent! You might as well tell me I should run a program that steals
pieces of silverware from my kitchen when I have my back turned!

Are you nuts? Who would do that?

No, my computing setup is relaxing. It’s a little bit like this
website: quirky, but stable. No popups. No "toast" notifications.
Just a machine calmly waiting for my input.

I’ll let you in on another fact, and brace yourself because this one may
shock you: I prefer operating systems and software that do not
automatically update themselves, even for security reasons. I update my
operating system and software when I am ready. Call me a computer
security heretic if you like and I will laugh and respond like the sicko I
am, "Ha ha, yes!"

Current favorites for being productive on the computer:

OpenBSD for the OS because it is cohesive and Just Works.

Vim for the text editor (lots of good choices in the editor category).

LibreWolf for browsing the web.

Dillo for browsing the web for a specific piece of information and then get the heck off and go back to whatever I was working on.

Ruby for scripting handy personal utilities.

GNU Imp, Inkscape, Krita for creating and editing images.

OpenBSD’s 6 month release schedule is perfect for me.

I’m pretty new to daily-driving Dillo as my main browser on one of my
computers, and I’ll probably have more to say about it in the near future.

You likely disagree with some of those choices. Great! This list
should be individualized and opinionated!

Less fragile

Imagine you are on a very long cross-country journey.
You brought a bunch of nice equipment with you. Some of it
was complicated and fragile and it broke. You had to discard those
things along the way. The things that didn’t break or were easily
repaired remain. Those pieces of equipment are your trusty companions.

The idiom to "use something in anger" means to "use it for real"
as opposed to just playing around. But the phrase is so colorful and I like
how it makes me picture someone in a cold sweat furiously typing
on a computer while a handful of onlookers crowd around with fingers crossed. Something
important hangs in the balance.

When those moments come, you suddenly stop caring
what things look like and how fashionable they are. You just care if they
work. In times like that, you remember which tools let you down and which
ones don’t!

Things that last

I love learning new things. But at some point, it began to dawn on me
that my learning often went into one of two categories:

Knowledge that was transient, sometimes even single-use.

Knowledge that lasted and would transfer.

Learning proprietary software has tended to go into the first category.

Learning BIOS/UEFI settings and hardware minutia has largely gone into the
first category (and it stinks because sometimes you practically have
to make a pact with demons for that information).

Learning the fundamentals of programming goes in the second category.

Learning Unix fundamentals, including programs that have been around since
the 1970s goes in the second category.

Note my use of the word "fundamentals" in those last two items.

I’ll invoke the
Lindy effect
(wikipedia.org) which seems, in my experience, to hold true:

"Longevity implies a resistance to change, obsolescence, or competition,
and greater odds of continued existence into the future."

The vi editor was released in 1976. 50 years ago! People still use it every
single day. It well may go on for another 50.

(As for the staying power of 1970s technology, trust me, I find it just as
perverse as you do that I’m still using techniques and tools that were
first created for teletype terminals that printed output on actual rolls
of paper. But it is what it is. Text interfaces have a ridiculously
low-barrier for creating, modifying, and combining programs. As devices
have changed, the text stuff just keeps working.)

In the arts, I find this very similar to learning the fundamentals of
drawing or writing. Practice these things and they’ll pay off forever.

Creative limitations and picking something and sticking with it

Another quote from the Wikipedia article on asceticism:

"Ascetics maintain that self-imposed constraints bring them greater
freedom in various areas of their lives, such as increased clarity of
thought and the ability to resist potentially destructive temptations."

The good stuff is in that apparent paradox: constraints = freedom.

It is a well-known phenomena in the art world that limitations can be our
greatest creative allies. Forcing yourself to use one brush or only