Links

Admin

2023-07-17 How to Passthrough a Disk in Proxmox
How to Passthrough a Disk in Proxmox
exactly as the title says, how to configure a drive to pass through proxmox to something else directly (in my case TrueNAS). One of a couple of articles used for this guidance.
2025-09-10 Jims Garage Mosquitto conf
another good example of conf for Mosquitto
Jims Garage has great videos for setting things up.
2025-03-24 Linux on Thinkpad guide
guide to getting linux on a thinkpad
2025-09-10 Quick Guide to The Mosquitto.conf File With Examples
written jan 2025, is helpful for sure
Mosquitto is a queue handler enabling connection of IoT to other networked systems and devices... having it working enables things like Home Assistant to connect to sensors and vacuums and things.
2025-01-05 Setting up guest wireless access on Tomato
useful and simple setup for guest vlan on tomato based routers

Agile

2023-05-11 10 Tips for Writing Good User Stories
"User stories are probably the most popular agile technique to capture product functionality: Working with user stories is easy. But telling effective stories can be hard. The following ten tips help you create good stories."
well laid out article talking about how and what of user stories
2023-05-11 An agile leader’s guide to writing user stories
An agile leader's guide to writing user stories
Talking about writing user stories as well. talks a bit about history but then offers basic template (Role, Goal, Benefit) and other how and what wisdom
2023-05-11 Tips & tricks for writing User Stories like a pro
Tips & tricks for writing User Stories like a pro — Product Owner guide part II.
Basic wisdom on why and what of User Stories
2023-05-11 Use cases vs user stories in Agile development
Use cases vs user stories in Agile development
2012 article distinguishing between Use Cases and user stories

Android

2024-01-16 ADB tips and tricks
Managing a new Android phone using desktop access to Android OS, tips for fixing and managing the phone more granularly
Enables things like un-installing unwanted apps, managing quick access buttons and other useful things.
2025-12-05 phonetrack for android
Built APKs for phonetrack a very handy and useful app for tracking a phone privately on NextCloud
The author has uploaded ancient versions of the apk to f-droid but the latest builds are here. The last build was Feb 2025 (at the time of this posting). I can not say enough good things about this app, you can use it to start sessions, log to multiple sessions at once and manage all the settings you need to control exactly how your tracking is maintained.
2025-05-23 Pixel C lineageos
firmware for Pixel C

Architecture

2023-05-10 Blueprints for recommender system architectures
Blueprints for recommender system architectures: 10th anniversary edition
Discussion of Netflix technology architecture for their recommender system.
Includes a review of additional recommender system architectures and how they seem to be evolving. Specifically discussed are
1. Netflix architecture from 10 yrs ago,
2. Eugene Yan’s 2 x 2 blueprint,
3. Nvidia’s 4 stage blueprint,
4. Fennel.ai’s 8 stage blueprint and finally
5. Netflix current architecture.
Lot's of good references, a high level summary of what's up with recommender architectures at this time.
2025-08-14 Capability Mapping
2023-02-23 Unleashing ML Innovation at Spotify with Ray
Exposition of Spotify's machine learning platform

Blogs

2023-04-06 It’s the hormones talking
Joyce, mom of Zoe in TO

Boating

2025-01-29 Folding DIY dinghy
Simple folding sailboat
bathtub with a sail... but it folds down to something small (considering as a project for vents)
2025-01-29 Welcome Aboard! A Guide to Maritime Customs and Traditions
how to behave on and around boats
a bit of what to expect and a bit of what to do.

Business Analysis

2023-05-11 10 Tips for Writing Good User Stories
"User stories are probably the most popular agile technique to capture product functionality: Working with user stories is easy. But telling effective stories can be hard. The following ten tips help you create good stories."
well laid out article talking about how and what of user stories
2023-05-11 An agile leader’s guide to writing user stories
An agile leader's guide to writing user stories
Talking about writing user stories as well. talks a bit about history but then offers basic template (Role, Goal, Benefit) and other how and what wisdom
2023-05-11 The Glossary: A Gateway to Clear Requirements and Communication
The Glossary: A Gateway to Clear Requirements and Communication
an article that lays out why and how a glossary can benefit an organization and business analysis
2023-05-11 Tips & tricks for writing User Stories like a pro
Tips & tricks for writing User Stories like a pro — Product Owner guide part II.
Basic wisdom on why and what of User Stories
2023-05-11 Use cases vs user stories in Agile development
Use cases vs user stories in Agile development
2012 article distinguishing between Use Cases and user stories

Camping

2025-07-12 Coleman Stove Model 425 Teardown Maintenance Rebuild and Leak Repair
video teardown
full tank valve disassembly, cleaning and rebuild.
2023-05-10 Coleman white gas stove tear down
shows how to tear down a coleman white gas stove
Talks about and has some pictures of how to tear down a coleman stove, including burners, gas plumbing and valve and pump assemblies on the gas tank.
This Youtube video is a good source as well.

Dungeons & Dragons

2025-05-16 map paper for DnD
awesome outdoor map grids for various paper and grid sizes

Entertainment

2025-04-30 BBC: The Story of English
The Story of English is an Emmy Award-winning nine-part television series produced in 1986, detailing the development of the English language. It was written by Robert MacNeil, Robert McCrum, and William Cran, directed by Cran, and originally broadcast on BBC and PBS. It was co-produced by MacNeil-Lehrer Productions and the BBC, and was principally funded through a grant from General Foods. The third episode, "A Muse of Fire", won the 1987 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement - Informational Programming - Writing. The series was released as a 5 tape box set in 2001, running 495 minutes.
Episode list: 1. An English Speaking World: Discusses how English has become the most dominant language throughout the world. 2. The Mother Tongue: Discusses the early stages of the English language, including Old English and Middle English. 3. A Muse of Fire: Discusses the influence of William Shakespeare and the King James Bible on the English language as well as how Early Modern English took root in the American colonies and its influence on contemporary American English. 4. The Guid Scots Tongue: Discusses the Scottish influence on the English language. 5. Black on White: Discusses the influence of Blacks on the English language. (Includes interviews with Philadelphia hip hop legends The Scanner Boys, Parry P and Grand Tone.) 6. Pioneers, O Pioneers!: Discusses Canadian English and the various forms of American English. 7. The Muvver Tongue: Discusses Cockney dialect and Australian English. 8. The Loaded Weapon: Discusses the Irish influence on the English Language. 9. Next Year's Words: Discusses the future and new emerging forms of the English language.
2025-08-07 Green Lantern Episodes
Quite good sound quality, 315 episodes include an Al Hodge interview
2025-04-30 Jazz a film by Ken Burns
Filmmaker Ken Burns tells the story of jazz — the quintessential American art form. The 10-part series follows the growth and development of jazz music from the gritty streets of New Orleans to the Lincoln Gardens on Chicago's south side, where Louis Armstrong first won fame, from Prohibition-era speakeasies to the wide-open clubs of Kansas City, from the elegant Roseland Ballroom in Times Square, where only whites were allowed to dance, to the more egalitarian Savoy Ballroom in Harlem, where people of all colors mingled. Six years in the making, Jazz features 75 interviews, more than 500 pieces of music, 2,400 still photographs and more than 2,000 archival film clips — many rare and never before seen. Third-person voices are provided by Samuel L. Jackson, Delroy Lindo, Derek Jacobi and Harry Connick Jr., among others.
the genius of America is improvisation, our unique experiment a profound intersection of freedom and creativity, for better and for worse, in nearly every gesture and breath. Nowhere is this more apparent than in jazz — the only art form created by Americans, an enduring and indelible expression of our genius and promise. And so, in Jazz, we complete our trilogy of American life, finding in the music's lines and phrases and riffs not only a meditation on American creativity, but a joyous and sublime celebration of the redemptive future possibilities of this remarkable republic.

friends

2023-04-06 It’s the hormones talking
Joyce, mom of Zoe in TO

Home Automation Setup

2024-10-01 Home Assistant and ESPhome in Docker
creating an ESPHome docker install and connecting it to a Home Assistant docker install
2025-09-10 Jims Garage Mosquitto conf
another good example of conf for Mosquitto
Jims Garage has great videos for setting things up.
2024-10-01 Self Hosted Push Notifications with Gotify and Home Assistant
setting up Gotify and notification automations with home assistant

linux

2025-06-21 Linux Newbie: Running Manjaro on MacBookPro
macbookPro 2015 manjaro install
2025-09-10 Quick Guide to The Mosquitto.conf File With Examples
written jan 2025, is helpful for sure
Mosquitto is a queue handler enabling connection of IoT to other networked systems and devices... having it working enables things like Home Assistant to connect to sensors and vacuums and things.

marketing

2023-05-11 About the Canada Anti-Spam Law (CASL):
A summary of CASL
Interprets the legislation so you can ensure you're onside with this legislation when doing marketing in Canada.
2023-02-23 Best times to send text marketing
Simple Texting take on when to send text marketing
Includes their research findings of how and when people are likely to be responsive to text marketing messages.
2023-02-23 How frequently to send SMS marketing messages
Good ideas for how often and what to send for SMS marketing
2025-02-12 Purpose: about Steward Ownership of business
An alternative to greed and profiteering within the current economy
2023-02-23 When is the best time to send SMS marketing
Mail charts assessment of when is the best time to send marketing texts
Includes a summary of what they have found in other research and how we behave with a phone in our hand.

ML/AI

2025-10-27 A.I. for Literacy: The Reading Roadmap (w/ David Chalk)
David Chalk talks about using AI to help teach literacy
2025-12-03 How to write a great agents.md: Lessons from over 2,500 repositories
2023-02-23 Unleashing ML Innovation at Spotify with Ray
Exposition of Spotify's machine learning platform
2025-10-27 Why one of the world’s most brilliant AI scientists left the US for China
interesting article about history of AI
2025-10-27 WordNet
Source for languages for AI

podcasts

2023-05-11 Canadian Voices
Great series of podcasts featuring Canadian thought leaders
2023-05-11 Decoder Ring Theatre
short story podcast of classic hard boiled detective Black Jack Justice and WWII hero the Red Panda, lots of fun
2023-05-11 Escape Pod
Sci-Fi short stories, awesome podcast
2025-02-12 Purpose: about Steward Ownership of business
An alternative to greed and profiteering within the current economy

Programming

2023-02-23 All Programming Philosophies Are About State
All Programming Philosophies Are About State
2023-02-23 Examples of floating point problems
Examples of floating point problems in javascript and other languages
2023-02-23 Examples of problems with integers
Examples of problems with integers in javascript and other languages
2025-03-24 Linux on Thinkpad guide
guide to getting linux on a thinkpad
2023-05-10 Python’s Missing Batteries
Python's Missing Batteries: Essential Libraries You're Missing Out On
Describes useful code libraries for Python and the use of some of the more attractive functions
Libraries referred to:
- Boltons (a collection of useful utilities for json and jsonl, date time and iteration handling)
  - jsonutils
  - timeutils
  - iterutils
- more-itertools (iteration tools
  - see article for more detail
- sh (shell command executor)
  - ls
  - contrib.sudo
  - any shell command really
- validators (data validation)
  - email
  - card.visa
  - ip_address.ipv4
- thefuzz (fuzzy search)
  - process.extract
- stackprinter (stack output for debugging)
  - set_excepthook
- icecream (print replacement)
  - ic
- freezegun (testing date time conditions, there is also a pytest-freezegun for the same purpose using the pytest framework)
  - freeze_time
- dirty_equals (another fuzzy matching library, makes testing for these things easier)
  - IsApprox
  - IsNow
  - IsJson
  - IsPostiveint
  - IsPartialDict
  - IsList
  - AnyThing
- pyperclip (clipboard handling)
  - copy
- tqdm (command line interface progress bars and progress output during execution)
  - tqdm
  - trange
lists additional links to library resources at the end of the article

Web Development

2023-07-04 2023 – CSS updates to the standard and how to use
great overview of latest in CSS
shows the history of CSS (briefly but accurately) and how to do things now with the modern CSS standard
2025-01-29 API for NFL results
Documentation for an API for NFL results
could be used for a project I'm thinking of...
2025-02-13 Extending the Query Loop block
how to add functionality to the Query Loop Block
hoping to use this to rebuild my archive page
2025-09-10 Jims Garage Mosquitto conf
another good example of conf for Mosquitto
Jims Garage has great videos for setting things up.
2025-09-10 Quick Guide to The Mosquitto.conf File With Examples
written jan 2025, is helpful for sure
Mosquitto is a queue handler enabling connection of IoT to other networked systems and devices... having it working enables things like Home Assistant to connect to sensors and vacuums and things.