Some things like MPD just get better with age.
How To Set MPD Up As a Single-User Player
How I did it in Linux Mint 22.3 'Zena'
These are the steps I took (and choices I made) to get MPD up and running for my user in Linux Mint …
read moreOther articles
Confession
We Are Sometimes Sure of Ourselves When We Should Not Be
Often because we want to believe.
I want to tell you a story.
I received a letter from Triumph USA about a safety recall on my bike. This is the second recall related to the same issue. Last time …
read moreSynergy
Logrotate
The obligatory AI generated creepy error-filled post image screen-clipped from search results.I have no idea why this took me so long. I needed this for years, but every time I looked at it, I decided to put it off.
Well no more.
I finally got around to setting up …
read moreEdit Nails It
Snapcast & Garbage
Welcome 'garbage', the latest member of PiNet. Garbage makes me smile every time I go into Bldg S2.Snapcast Is Really Wonderful
Garbage is too!
Wha? Garbage is the name given to the latest node of my PiNet. It has that name because it is made mostly of leftover parts …
read moreOctopi Brings Octoprint to Prusa
Octoprint is not new or exciting. But I figured it was still worth writing about.
To clarify: OctoPi is my PiNet hostname for the hardware. Octoprint is the software.If you have a 3D printer, you should consider Octoprint.
I first looked into Octoprint while waiting on my Prusa i3 …
read moreBldg S1 Gets a Coffee Bar
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This is how we made coffee before. It was, let's just say . . . not fun.Every workspace needs a place for the occasional cup.
Being banished from the house out to my former shop building required a bit of adjustment. In my old office, now the "adult guest room" which is …
read moreVolts, Watts, Amps, Water
The Hoover Dam, circa 2013. This is the prime example of a hydro-electric dam and a great way to visualize the 3D nature of electricity.My Take on an Old Analogy
I've always had problems grasping the relationships between volts, amps and watts.
I've seen analogies with water that almost …
read moreThe Case of the Harbor Freight Case
A Crying Case For Better Case Latches
This faux Pelican case is like the poster child for Harbor Freight: It almost works great.
The case latches do not stand out away from the case when you open them. They flop uselessly back down where they impede my progress. That was …
read moreA House for Every Relay
My current favorite relay board.A PiNet Without Relays is Like a Day Without Sunshine.
There is a host of small inexpensive microcontrollers available such as the Raspberry Pi's, Arduinos, and ESP32, and they are great for controlling stuff. But many things we want to control require more power than …
read moreqr4wd - Handle QR Codes on the Windows Desktop
Confronted with a QR Code on a Windows desktop and a desire to get that text without using a phone camera, what do you do?QR Codes Can Be Handy. Or Not.
"Scan this QR Code with your device." Obviously the developer thinks I want the code's information on my …
read moreA Boring Fan Hack
My new shop ceiling fan. Doing what a fan is supposed to do. Fanning.Just Another Story About Making Working Things Out of Junk
One of my favorite things is making a thing to meet a need out of stuff I already have. The fact that I do this time …
read moreBug Control
I recently did a four-day trip to South Georgia and back. Spent three nights in The Bug. It was wonderful.We Don't Like Bugs
We have been very fortunate thus far. Our few real uses of The Bug have been pretty bug-free. Insects have pretty much left us alone. But …
read moreShields Up!
The Bug has two new forward solar panels, and now it has deflector shields to protect them from flying debris.Forward Shields are up, Sir!
The Bug originally had two solar panels. After some time it became apparent it would be worth adding two more, so that's what I did …
read moreWhat is The Bar and Why Raise It?
Such a fun little guy. Just makes me smile.(Updated to include adequate info to build your own.)
It is what it is, and it pleases me.
It is such a simple thing. It's not fancy. It does not evoke cool. It does not perform any singluar significant function that …
read moreAndrauthentic
May I Suggest a New Term
Andrauthentic
I wrote The Last Gasp of Trust a few days ago. I just updated that article to include a section titled, "(Dis)Trust and Verify". I needed a term to describe web content that had the quality of being actually generated by human …
read moreThe Last Gasp of Trust
Nothing Stays the Same
I enjoyed the few years where we could trust at least some web search results.
I spent a brief stint as a website content writer in the early 10's. It was for several of the thousands of click-through sites designed both to be helpful and to …
read moreSneaky IPv6
IPv6 is like a zombie apocalypse.
You can kill it, but if you're not paying close attention, it will come back to haunt you.
A little background: I have IPv6 turned off in my main router because it creates more problems than it solves for me at this point in …
read moreCharlie - Six Months In
The Rat
This rat-like creature has just had a bath. He looked much worse before that.You may recall from my previous treatise that my wife found a pitiful mangy-looking furry object in our front flower bed late one night. She named him Charlie.
The Cat
Practically a Miracle Transformation …
read moreShakedown for The Bug
We traveled to Mississippi and did an overnighter at a KOA campground 150 miles away. It was a good test of The Bug's systems.The Bug Proves Its Metal
This project has FINALLY reached its end. We just wrapped up a 300 mile round-trip overnight shakedown test of The Bug …
read moreAn openSCAD Toggle Switch Housing
This is the stereotypical SPST toggle switch. These are everywhere.A Home for Every Switch
I like toggle switches. I like the tactile impression they make on my finger as I flip them. The satisfying click that tells me, 'yes, it did'.
But sometimes mounting them is a bit of …
read moreCharlie
The Woods
The woods behind our house. Thick, full of danger.The Sound
"Did you hear that?" I ask. "What?", she says. "I thought I heard a cat crying in the woods out there." She stops, listens and says, "No, I don't hear anything."
I go on about my business …
read moreWiremold End Plug
Clipped from the Legrand website, this is the Wiremold 500/700 Small Raceway we've all come to know and love.Wiremold
You've seen it. You probably just didn't notice. It's ubiquitous like walls and floors.
Wiremold has been around a long time, and is a very useful product. In my …
read moreCat Proof
What in the world happened here!?"My Dog Ate My Homework, Miss, I Swear!"
If you have pets, it's generally a choice you've made. Kinda like getting married or having kids, or both . . . or neither, but you get my point.
We love our pets. Dogs, cats, weasles, skunks, chickens, skinks …
read moreMMC4W - the Minimal MPD Client for Windows
The Thrill is Gone, Internet
Bored. So bored. So very bored.I am SO bored with the Internet anymore.
It was the 1980's and the sky was the limit. The Internet was going to change the world . . . and it did. We were excited by all the possibilities, like a child on December 20th looking toward …
read moreSyncthing: My Favorite Synced Storage Solution
Choice and Peers: Two concepts important to this post.I'm 97% sure I've finally found a file storage/backup/sync solution that works.
Dropbox, Ubuntu One, Google Drive, OneDrive, and don't forget Box and ownCloud.
What do all these have in common? I've tried them, and I don't like them …
read moreFan-Tastic!
The Yaesu FP-1030A is a great power supply. 5-stars!This is Not Rocket Science
I never said everything I post here is going to knock your socks off. This little blurb certainly will not do that.
However, when I find something that is pretty easy to do and makes my …
read moreTogether at Last: Hamlib, Log4OM2, Fldigi, JS8Call & WSJT-X
Coming. Going. Streaming. Flowing.Step by Step: How to Get Hamlib Working in Windows
"If this is too long for you to read, then maybe you don't need to know." Teaching Men to FishI'm new to HF. And HF is new. HF is being reinvented every day. For …
read moreAn Antenna Saga
Four antennas and 3 guy lines. Yes!Two Antennas Are Simply Not Enough
Ham radio is a hobby. It can be much more than that, but it goes well with a large dish of experimentation and learning. That's the biggest appeal to me.
I knew when I made the leap …
read moreStill Got It
Image: The yoke holding the pulley is there.Let one thing be perfectly clear: I am an old man.
I am past both the social and legal definition of retirement age. I still work full-time, and will continue to do so as long as they want me and I want …
read moreRabbit Trails
Image: This was purchased to replace a very old AA battery powered cordless trimmer."You Get What You Pay For"
. . . or so they say. But sometimes you don't even get that.
My old Wahl AA battery powered beard and mustache trimmer was on its last leg. It had endured leaky …
read moreThe Return of Ham
Image: This is what I call fun.Many years ago in a far-away land . . .
. . . there lived a not-quite-so-young man who was about to realize a life-long dream: he was about to get his ham radio license.
It was the mid-90's in the Great Republic of Texas and my wife and …
read moreThe Monstrosity Gets An Appendage
Image: This is The Monstrosity. It was thusly named by my wife.What was "big and ugly" is now even better!
My hobby bench was in a seriously sad state. I can't believe I don't have a picture. I can only guess I was too embarrassed to let anyone see …
read moreSometimes the Best Reason is Just Because
Sometimes No Real Reason is All You Need
Image: It all started here: a condenser fan motor.When I was a child I rarely needed a good reason to do a thing. When asked why I had done a thing, quite often my first response was, "Uh, I dunno. Just …
read moreIR Remote Controls with Linux
Adding Remote Control of the Stereo Receiver to PlayerPi via Brilliant
Image: The screen served by Brilliant on my local network.(PlayerPi? Brilliant? wha?) 1 Photo gallery below.
It is possible to control devices using IR with a Raspberry Pi running Raspbian.
In the old days if you wanted to …
read moreI Got Your IPv6
Image: This is an IPv6 address. Gaze upon its glory, mortal.The Glacial Creep of IPv6 Adoption Creeps Into My Stuff
I was having problems with random wifi dropouts.
WeatherPi, DoorPi and LilWeatherPi all suffered from a tendancy to just randomly lose their wifi connection for no apparent reason. Video …
read moreRecycled Wood Makes Great Holiday Project
Does this look like a project to you? It does to me.It's one thing to read about recycling on the Internet, or to see kids shows promote the ideals of good stewardship of resources. It's another thing altogether to actually make something useful out of junk. I maintain the …
read moreWeatherPi Lives Up to Every Expectation
This month is the 3-year anniversary of the deployment of WeatherPi
When I built WeatherPi, I was trying for a robust, reliable, repairable Raspberry Pi based weather station. So far, it has lived up to every expectation.
WeatherPi has now lasted three times longer than either of two consecutive Accurite …
read moreOne-Shot IR Helper
Turning this schematic into functioning hardware is the goal of this exercise.Sometimes you just need one thing done. This was one of those times.
This is a quick and not-too-dirty tool that does one job well.
The Pi Pico makes it pretty simple and cheap. MicroPython and the IR …
read moreDeBugging the Rain Sensor, Literally.
Some time ago, one of the GPIO pins on WeatherPi stopped working. It was the one the tipping bucket rain gauge was attached to. I was able to move the wire to another pin, and change my program. Problem solved.
When the rain gauge stopped working again, I assumed I …
read moreOpenSCAD files for LCDPi
This post is a listing of the OpenSCAD code for the 3D printed parts of the LCDPi. Slideshow at the bottom.
This is PiddlePi, one of the P*Pi's.
Here is the main body file. I have it saved as "2004 LCD case.scad".
read more// Dr.Gerg's Pi LCD Mount …Put Line Numbers in Python print() Output
If you have more than a hundred lines in your Python script, remembering where in the flow any particular print output comes from can cause you pause. I felt like having the line number from my code would help me more quickly and easily recognize the output.
I googled to …
read moreThe Monstrosity
This article was brought here after 4 years at Hack-a-day.io.
The Monstrosity is this 4x4 frame which allows me to build the workstation I need without marring or drilling any holes into the walls of our spare bedroom.As you can see, there are 3 computers and six displays …
read moreThe Tiniest Thing
I've printed a bunch of parts on the Prusa printer. But today (yesterday, actually) I printed the smallest functional part I've ever done. Roughly 7x7x5mm. Tiny thing.
The tiny thing is part of PoohPi.
PoohPi sits at my wife's desk and greets her every morning with statistics that will inform …
read moreOpenSCAD 1602 LCD with i2C
Here's another model in my project. It's a 2-row 16 character per row LCD screen with an i2c interface module attached. I'll be using this to display whatever I want on my portable project.
You may be wondering what the value of this is. The value is in fitting this …
read moreOpenSCAD Pi Zero Model
When I build things using the Prusa 3D printer, I like to also create a model of the part I'm making brackets or enclosures for. That way I can see how the whole thing is going to fit together without making bad assumptions about how any particular part is going …
read morePiNet - the Weather Station
I like knowing what the temperature is in my back yard.
And the rainfall amount when it's raining. And the wind speed and direction. That's why I've had a weather station in my backyard for several years now.
We had two Accurite stations in two years. Both crapped out after …
read morePiNet - the pool
Pool Pump and Lighting Control
When my wife's in-ground pool was completed, it quickly became apparent the controls for the pump and lights were designed in a tech vacuum.
The control head (receiver, and manual buttons) was attached to the power panel through a knockout on top. It looked like …
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