Blog listing

News, tips, and commentary from Willing Consulting

News, tips, and commentary on Python, open source, data science, and AI from Carol Willing.
container registry with napari image

Experimenting with napari and a remote GPU vm

Searching for a cost-effective remote GPU vm to run napari for exploration and development.

2025-05-29
Carol Willing
container registry with napari image

Setting up napari using containers - Part 1

What I learned playing with napari and containers.

2024-11-19
Carol Willing
napari viewer with cells and nuclei

Setting up a napari development environment (M1 MacOS)

What I learned setting up a napari development environment on my M1 Mac.

2024-11-11
Carol Willing
PyLadies Snowboard in my office

Thankful for PyLadies Conferences

Empower the current and next generation of Pythonistas

2023-11-20
Carol Willing

AI Ethics, Posts, and a Madlib

Instructions: Fill in the blanks with the appropriate word types (noun, verb, adjective, etc.) to complete the AI ethics-themed story.
2023-06-04
Carol Willing

Let’s make something Shiny and Interactive 

from ipyleaflet import Map, Marker, basemaps, basemap_to_tiles
m = Map(
  basemap=basemap_to_tiles(
    basemaps.NASAGIBS.ModisTerraTrueColorCR, "2017-04-08"
  ),
  center=(…
2023-06-04
Carol Willing

Migrating to a Quarto website and blog

Why and how I migrated my website and blog to Quarto

2023-06-03
Carol Willing

Serving on the Inaugural Python Steering Council

A Closer Look – Encouraging people to run for the Python Steering Council and offer insight on being a Steering Council member.

2019-11-02
Carol Willing

Trying the Python 3.8 beta with Jupyter Notebook

Try out Python 3.8.0b4 with Jupyter Notebook on macOS

2019-09-19
Carol Willing

Learning git: Locations, Remotes, and GitHub

Where is code located? The basics of remotes for new git and GitHub users.

2019-07-01
Carol Willing

Cool Stuff with Jupyter and IPython

Here are some resources that I have found helpful when learning Jupyter or IPython.

2018-10-01
Carol Willing

Getting (re)Started - Resources

I’m often asked what resources would be helpful when returning to tech after an absence or moving into tech from another career.

2018-09-30
Carol Willing

Sunrise and a New Semester

Sunrise signals a new day and new opportunities. I’m taking on a new challenge over the next six months. In some ways, I will be changing my focus from developing Jupyter tools to sharing how to use these Jupyter tools as well as others, like nteract, CircuitPython, mu, EduBlocks and p5.js, to foster learning.

2018-08-08
Carol Willing

Snakes and Planets

As I get ready to step back from being a Director of the Python Software Foundation, I’m taking a moment to reflect back on the past two years on the PSF Board and open…
2017-06-04
Carol Willing

What’s a Fab Lab?

A Fab Lab is a community space for people to gather and fabricate their dreams and ideas.
2015-08-09
Carol Willing

Change, community, and compassion

Today, I reflect on a life changing event. For a few days, we came together from around the world to form a community to share our thoughts on change and our compassion for…
2015-06-09
Carol Willing

Mission moment: Mark Hammond, PSF Distinguished Service Award Recipient

Source: Mark Hammond and Andy Robinson, Python Programming on Win32, O’Reilly & Associates, Inc., 2000.
2015-06-09
Carol Willing

Play it again pyvideo.org!

Yesterday, the Python Software Foundation posted results of the election for the Board of Directors 2015-2016 term. Thank you to the many individuals that participated and…
2015-06-03
Carol Willing

Mentors, music, and motivation

As I get ready to attend the Write/Speak/Code conference, I’m doing more reflecting on the past few months than packing for the trip. While I would like to leave San Diego…
2015-03-18
Carol Willing

Fab Lab San Diego Team. Credit: Carol Willing

Building a better community

Watching someone bring their idea to life is an amazing reward.
2015-03-04
Carol Willing

Security at the Seams: What’s a Software Development Manager to Do?

Economics of Cybersecurity Reflection Essay

2015-03-02
Carol Willing

Decorators visualized

Decorators make code more readable. When learning how decorators work, it’s easy to get confused. When teaching decorators, students often ask “but how does it work” and…
2015-02-18
Carol Willing

I am not a tree. I am a person. I speak for me.

For years, I enjoyed reading Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax to my children. Today, a wise quote from the book pops into my head when I read a twitter post by or about Mr. Wadhwa.
2015-02-03
Carol Willing

Music, Data Science, and Community - Poster at PyCon 2014

I had the pleasure of sharing my love of music and programming last spring at PyCon 2014. I enjoyed presenting a poster about music21, a computer aided musicology framework.…
2015-01-21
Carol Willing

SciPy 2014: A mother-daughter collaboration

I had the pleasure of sharing SciPy 2014 with my daughter. Well, the chance to share SciPy 2014 with a more grown up version of my daughter than the three year old girl…
2014-07-14
Carol Willing

Security and Cryptography Gems

I find cryptography and security fascinating. My current knowledge is limited to some math reading on cryptography years ago and some journal articles in IEEE, ACM, and…
2014-06-27
Carol Willing

Learning on Campus

Monday Mention: Newcomers to Open Source Development

Are you new to open source?
2014-03-03
Carol Willing

Cat enjoying git goodness

Saturday Sharing: Some git goodness

Version control and sharing source code help developers hone their craft. If you are new to developing software, learning git can seem a confusing task. In many ways, git is…
2014-03-01
Carol Willing

Thoughts for Tuesday: Two Django-licious Scoops

Audrey Roy and Daniel Greenfeld have recently released Two Scoops of Django: Best Practices For Django 1.6 (Two Scoops Press). Besides helpful books, Audrey and Daniel give…
2014-02-18
Carol Willing

Python Pocket Reference

Weekend Wisdom: “Python Pocket Reference” by Mark Lutz; O’Reilly Media

As someone who teaches beginning Pythonistas to l1earn to program, this updated edition of the Python Pocket Reference is worth keeping close at hand.
2014-02-07
Carol Willing

Weekend Sharing: Installing Inkscape on a recent Mac

At a recent FabLab San Diego meetup, I was helping others to install Inkscape. I wrote some tips down from my install experience. Here’s a link to the PDF. I hope these…
2013-12-22
Carol Willing

What can you do in 8 minutes? The importance of allies in advocacy

8 minutes and 18 seconds. It’s a small amount of time. Yet, Laila Al-Shamma uses it wisely. Recently, Laila Al-Shamma was honored by GLSEN as the 2013 Student Advocate of…
2013-10-22
Carol Willing

Weekend Whimsy: String theory, The Hics, and Candy Chang

I’m keeping it short this morning while I write a little software. I’m enjoying some good music, art, and community. Enjoy! I’ve been singing this gem from A Capella…
2013-09-29
Carol Willing

Thoughts for Tuesday: Tea Leaves

It’s been a week.
2013-09-24
Carol Willing

Succulent in pot

Weekend Wisdom: Distributed Network Data

Distributed Network Data by Alasdair Allan and Kipp Bradford (O’Reilly Media)
2013-08-24
Carol Willing
Up to us logo

Moving Forward Monday: Meaningful, Mindful, Mental Health Resources

Note: The links to other sites and this post may have triggers to those healing.
2013-08-19
Carol Willing
MIT OpenCourseWare OCW

Learn: MIT OpenCourseWare OCW

Donate to MIT OCW.
2013-08-13
Carol Willing
Carol's mom

Moving Forward Monday: Mountains or Molehills

I recently moved my mom into a nursing home. My dad, who has been her steady caregiver for many years, had made the decision that they needed more care and support during my…
2013-08-12
Carol Willing

Lady Ada Lovelace

Moving Forward Monday: The Ada Initiative

If you haven’t heard yet about the Ada Initiative, I highly recommend that you check out the good work that they are doing for women and men in open source technology
2013-03-18
Carol Willing

Learning and Teaching Courses in an Open Environment - XBlock

Kudos for edX opening the technical insides of its very successful platform for development of content rich learning and course delivery. XBlock, the API, is available for…
2013-03-15
Carol Willing

International Women’s Day 2013

What a great way to wrap up a week. There has been so much going on this week about women and girls in technology. Great work and passion by so many people - female or male. …
2013-03-08
Carol Willing

Sharing the Knowledge

I have the pleasure of mentoring a talented group of high school students. They are the soul of Team 2102 Paradox of San Dieguito Academy. They are creative, curious…
2013-02-10
Carol Willing

Using Senses to Guide Yourself Through the Fog

My mom has Alzheimer’s.

2013-02-05
Carol Willing
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