Category: Computers

  • TIL: mIRC is still a thing

    TIL: mIRC is still a thing

    Back when I first started getting into the internet and hadn’t started using Linux yet, I needed a way to get onto the chat protocol known as IRC. Back then I used mIRC. Later on I started using Linux and used all kinds of IRC programs including XChat, BitchX, and Konversation. But recently most open…

  • Programming Update: Nov 2022

    November was not a huge programming month for me. On the weekends I was a little more focused with family stuff and videogames. But I did manage work on a couple projects. Ever since 2010, I’ve been been using Python to automatically post my top 3 artists to Twitter. In 2020, it even became my…

  • Is there a replacement in the Fediverse for the Creative Class?

    I was on Identi.ca back when it first launched and I joined Mastodon a few years ago. Identi.ca had a decent number of FLOSS devs at the time, but by the time of Mastodon, Twitter was ascendant. So “no one” was on Mastodon. Even a few of the FLOSS developers I followed on Mastodon never…

  • Review: Data Visualization with Python and JavaScript: Scrape, Clean, Explore & Transform Your Data

    Data Visualization with Python and JavaScript: Scrape, Clean, Explore & Transform Your Data by Kyran Dale My rating: 4 of 5 stars While a book about web technologies is undoubtablely going to get out of date (especially when Javascript is involved), I would definitely recommend this book if you want to do some data visualization…

  • Review: Flask Web Development: Developing Web Applications with Python

    Flask Web Development: Developing Web Applications with Python by Miguel Grinberg My rating: 5 of 5 stars I read the second edition of the book I’ve read lots of books covering web frameworks or GUI programming (both involve UI design and a different workflow where you’re often waiting for user input), but this one is…

  • Programming Update: October 2022

    As October came around, it was time to get ready for Hacktoberfest. I’ve been participating for the past few years and I love the fact that DigitalOcean supports this project which gets more people to contribute to free and open source software.  In the past, I’ve often contributed to my Extra Life Donation Tracker. Since…

  • Web Browsers: Brave on Linux and Brave in the News

    Web Browsers: Brave on Linux and Brave in the News

    As I did last time, I wanted my web browser post to contain both news stories about browsers that have caught my attention and my thoughts on the newest web browser I’m trying out. Let’s start with the news. As you probably have heard if you’re paying any attention to browsers, one of the selling…

  • Programming Update: Sept 2022

    This month I wanted to practice Go outside of Advent of Code puzzles. So I decided I would port over my Dreamhost DNS updating script from Python to Go. This would have the advantage of being a compiled program. Every time I update Python on my system, the virtual environment points to the wrong Python…

  • Warning: Bug in latest Pipewire packages for Fedora 36

    This morning I updated my Fedora 36 computer and suddenly it could no longer find any sound devices. Thanks to a Fedora user who commented on this reddit thread, I found that the solution was to downgrade my Pipewire packages. Specifically, at this point in time: A reboot didn’t make it work on its own.…

  • Programming Update: Aug

    August was a programming-filled month for me. It focused entirely on Python and I mostly continued working on established projects. Let’s jump in! Amortization I wanted to re-calculate the amortization table for my home loan for the first time in about a year. As a refresher, I created this program (vs using Excel or an…

  • Course Review: Modern APIs with FastAPI, MongoDB and Python

    I’ve attended a few of Michael Kennedy’s Python courses over at TalkPython.fm. He’s a great instructor and he really knows his Python. (As well he should, as host of Talk Python and co-host of Python Bytes) His usual courses at Talk Python are pre-recorded and I believe this was Michael’s first time doing an online…

  • Web Browsers: Linux Update; Firefox mistakes

    It’s been seven months since I last wrote about testing out new browsers on my computers. In addition to talking about what I’m doing, I wanted to muse about whether Mozilla really missed the mark with Firefox.  I’m going to start with the second point first. I forgot what brought them to my attention, but…

  • Programming Update May-July 2022

    I started working my way back towards spending more time programming as the summer started (in between getting re-addicted to CDProjektRed’s Gwent).  I started off by working on my btrfs snapshot program, Snap in Time. I finally added in the ability for the remote culling to take place. (My backup directories had started getting a…

  • If you get a LEGO Boost set and can’t update the firmware…

    There’s apparently a bit of a software fail for the LEGO company. When you launch the LEGO Boost app, it won’t continue until you’ve updated the firmware. It asks you to connect so it can update it, but it never actually updates. As I learned in this reddit thread, you actually need to get a…

  • Fedora 36, KDE Plasma 5, and Wayland Part 2

    After using Plasma with KWayland for about a week, I had to go back to X11 because it’s not yet ready for me. There are 3 main issues I’m having: Occasionally, when I come back to my computer after locking the screen it would say that the screen locker had crashed. I would need to…