About
The Golden Ratio, The Golden Mean, The Divine Proportion. All terms describing a ’simple’ mathematical concept. Namely the proportion between two parts of a whole that equals the proportion of the larger part to the whole. Or, expressed in a slightly less abstract term: the proportion between x and y (where y>x) such that it equals the proportion between y and x+y. The old Greeks used the letter Phi (φ) to represent this number and Pythagoras used it drawn the ‘perfect’ pentagram. It has been proven to be an irrational number, actually the most irrational number. There are many ways to calculate this strange number, but the easiest way is by adding the squareroot of 5 to 1 and dividing the sum by 2. This will approximately equal 1.61803.
Phi can also much more than ‘just’ a number. It is a proportion that can be found in numerous work of art as well as in many of nature’s creations if one is willing to look for it. The proportion seems to give objects a pleasing visual balance. It can be used to describe the development of mollusk shells as well as the breeding process of rabbits. The packing of seeds and the placement of petals on a flower can also be described using the little number.
Why create a site named after this number? I’m afraid there aren’t any deep, thoughtfull reasons behind it. It is a number that I’ve found interesting for quite some time – both the mathematical properties of it and how easily some people press in onto various aspects of life and nature. But this blog isn’t going to be about that number, or even much about mathematics for that matter. It will be about my other main interest in life; computers and everything related to it.
Programming has been my main hobby for quite some time, and lately I’ve been working as a web developer. In my journey among various programming languages and applications of them, the Internet has been my greatest teacher. Now I finally feel that I’ve gotten to a level of knowledge and experience that I can start to give something of that back, and hopefully someone will find my posts here interesting and useful.
My main platform of choice for programming is Linux, and lately the Ubuntu-distro. Since I love to customize things I have naturally spent many, many hours tinkering with my OS, trying to get it to behave in just the right way for me. In search for the knowledge needed to do whatever it was I needed I’ve found lots of sources for information, some good and some bad. This search, and continued customizing, of both Linux and any other software I end up tinkering with, will also be documented here for others to enjoy. Hopefully this page can be counted as one of the good sources of information after a while.